An Iron Man Christmas Carol  A Love Story
by BrethlessM
Summary: In which Tony finds some Christmas spirit, and learns that with so little time allotted to us, one should never hesitate in love. More movieverse than comic, but influenced by both. - Edited and Complete!
1. Chapter 1

**An Iron Man Christmas Carol ~**

**A Love Story**

_Stave the First_

_In which the protagonist of our story, Master Anthony Stark, is visited by an old friend._

His parents were dead, to begin with. That was the main reason Tony Stark had not celebrated Christmas, outside of Stark Industries holiday parties (which he never seemed able to avoid), since the death of his parents nearly fifteen years earlier.

He had nothing against Christmas, per se. Once upon a time, it had been his favorite holiday. But, as he was quick to suggest when the topic arose, Christmas was for families and now, Tony had none. He didn't even have that many friends to recommend him, and the friends he did have were (in a bit of irony that never escaped him) somehow also on his payroll.

California's greatest concession to the season had arrived early Christmas Eve morning in the form of a rainstorm that brought a low fog in from off the ocean. It crowded in at the windows, prematurely darkening their Malibu rooms and, as Pepper had described it in a fit of seasonal joy, gave the impression of snow piled against the windowpanes.

They had been inside all day – Tony in his lab and Pepper mostly in her office, canceling afternoon meetings and appointments. California was a place where even the threat of inclement weather could send people searching for cover, and though he knew Pepper wasn't overly concerned with the rain and fog herself, she knew two very important truths: First, that Californians became a little frantic whenever the weather turned to anything but the usual sunshine, and second, that Californians couldn't drive in the rain.

Pleased for the respite from meetings, Tony relished the excuse to burrow deeply into his real work – upgrading, testing, and creating to his heart's content. Pepper interrupted only once with soup, a sandwich, and an apple, then left him alone.

He didn't notice when Pepper returned to collect his dishes. In fact, he noticed nothing outside of his work as the hours passed, until a voice at his elbow drew his attention by the simple virtue of not being Pepper's.

"You gonna work through Christmas, or you thinking you might grace someone who's not a robot with your presence?" Rhodey stood with his usual military bearing beside Tony's workbench, an easy smile on his face.

Tony answered him, returning his attention to his work. "Jealous of the 'bots, Platypus? I'm touched. I bet if you asked nice, Dummy'd let you hold the fire extinguisher for a while."

"Cute, Tony," Rhody thumped his fist against Tony's bicep, making sure not to cause his friend to electrocute himself, or him. "Look, I know you've got this mental block thing about celebrating the holidays, but I'm still gonna invite you to my place Christmas day."

"Flattering, but then I'll feel obligated to put out, and that would just be awkward."

"I'm serious." Rhodey circled the worktable until he was directly in front of Tony, who was carefully examining the wiring of what looked like a coffeemaker. "I've been in touch with some of the old crowd from M.I.T. on Facebook. They've all friended you, which you'd know if you bothered to check it."

He didn't bother looking up. "Pass me the pliers? Uh… needle nose." Tony picked up a short length of wire sitting nearby, at the ready. "I usually let Pep handle all that stuff. Saves me the hassle." Which was only partly true. Tony could charm and Tony could inspire and Tony could flirt, but when it came to regular everyday interactions with other people - that was one of the few places in which he continuously missed the mark.

Besides, he suspected Pepper kept him away from social networking websites to keep him from getting into more trouble than usual with the people he found there.

"Well, you can make it up to them by coming over to my place for Christmas brunch." Rhodey found the pliers Tony needed and passed them over. "We're all getting together for a few hours to catch up. It'd be a shame not to have you there."

"Brunch?" Tony raised an incredulous eyebrow, pausing long enough in this work to give his friend a look. "Sounds like little old ladies at a tea party, to me. No thanks."

"Tony, you can't just sit around here all day, getting loaded and operating heavy machinery. It's stupid, for one," Rhodey said, clearly exasperated. "For another, it's dangerous. You're not exactly a young man anymore."

Tony grimaced at the reminder of his age. "Actually, as it turns out, I can. You celebrate Christmas in your way, Platypus, and let me celebrate it in mine," he said, replacing wires inside the coffee maker. "And I don't always just sit around the house; Last year I vacationed in Cabo."

"You mean you drank so much you can't remember how you ended up in Cabo – with four women, none of whom spoke English, or any language in common with one another. It took Pepper two days to trace your cell phone signal to where you'd lost it on the beach, and then find out which hotel you were in from there. This might all be fun and games to you, Tone, but she's the one cleaning up your messes. Have a little pity on her for once and spend Christmas with me."

Little provoked an emotional response from Tony more than the mention of his parents, Obadiah Stane, a certain three months in Afghanistan, or his personal assistant. He didn't answer right away, focusing on finishing his project and trying to relax the tic in his jaw. He reminded himself that Rhodey was his best friend and meant well, even if he wasn't always aware how his comments cut.

"What occurs between Ms. Potts and myself isn't any of your business, Jim." His voice was calm, but the use of his friend's given name was a clear indication of Tony's mood. Standing up, he turned the coffee maker over – it was easily recognizable now – and began putting the basket and pot back into their proper places. "I pay her a great deal of money to do what she does, and if she has anything to complain about, she will do so most vehemently on her own behalf."

"Yeah, well whatever you're paying her," Rhodey grumbled, backing off with a parting shot. "It's nowhere near what she deserves."

Tony snorted, a smirk playing across his mouth. "There, we're in agreement."

Leaning on the worktable, Rhody tried again. "Come on, man. Beer, food, old friends, and you can even sleep it off on my sleeper sofa."

His answer was delayed by the timely click-clack of Pepper's shoes as she came into the workshop.

"_Good evening, Ms. Potts. A Happy Christmas to you as well."_

"Thank you, J.A.R.V.I.S." The smile was apparent in Pepper's voice as she crossed the lab to where the two men were. No matter how busy she was, the holidays never failed to put her in a good mood.

Rhodey turned to Tony, pointing behind him to where Pepper was finishing her approach. "See that?" Rhodey said, eyebrows raised. "Even your robot major domo's got the holiday spirit. Hi, Pepper."

Pepper beat Tony to the punch. "J.A.R.V.I.S. isn't a robot, he's an A.I. – Just Another Rather Very Intelligent System. Hello, Rhodey. Trying to convince Tony not to be such a Scrooge? I wish you luck."

"It's like what would happen if your old Duke Nukem software taught itself tae bo, then explained it to you ad nauseum," Tony added, taking the glass coffee pot to the sink to fill.

Pepper rolled her eyes in Rhodey's direction. "Don't listen to him. J.A.R.V.I.S. is just an information system programmed to process and analyze data, essentially thinking for itself."

"Just?" Tony called back over the sound of the running water. He brought back the coffee pot, preparing it to perform its central function. "Excuse me, '_Just'_, an ingenious system that's given me the power to create virtual life?"

Her eye-roll this time involved a head roll and an exasperated huff. "I'm sorry, Rhodey, Tony thinks he's God again. He may need to be sedated, before his head swells any further." Pepper whirled back to Tony eyes narrowed. "What… are you doing with the coffee pot?"

"This?" Tony poured the water into the basket and placed the pot back underneath. The grin he shot Pepper's way was that of an eight-year old who'd just put together his first model car. "Oh, I just gave it a little upgrade. Now it'll make coffee twice as fast, and it'll self-regulate ground insertion into the basket." His grin widened and he leaned toward her, his expression and voice making the innocent question sound far more lascivious than it should have been. "You want a cup of coffee?"

"No. Thank you." Pepper deadpanned.

Rhodey watched their back and forth in silence, amused, as always.

"I need your signature," Pepper pressed on, her professional armor returned intact. "I'm going to put these in the mail on my way home, so if you could just not give me any trouble for, like, the next ten minutes till I'm out the door, it would be the best Christmas present ever."

Tony waved a hand in her direction, turning on the coffee maker. "In a minute." Ignoring Pepper's impatient sigh, he watched the machine jump to life with an almost silent whir of air, as coffee began to fall as though pressurized by air. Grinning like a mad man, he grabbed his empty mug and bounced on his toes excitedly for the thirty quick seconds it took to fill the glass pot.

"Sure you don't want?" Tony waggled both the mug and his eyebrows in their direction, making Rhodey grimace.

To her credit, Pepper remained stone-faced as she pushed the papers under his nose again. "Arrows. Sign. Now."

She had entered his personal space, and Tony took that as an invitation to further invade hers. "Just one sip," he murmured cheekily, the mug at even level with her papers. "Tell me I'm a genius, and I'll do whatever you want."

They stood toe-to-toe against each other and Rhodey could practically hear the wheels turning in Pepper's head as she considered her options, making certain she wasn't stepping into something involuntarily. Tony didn't back down, and didn't lose the lopsided grin that had disarmed any number of women.

Taking the mug from his hand, Pepper maintained eye contact with Tony as she took a sip. If the liquid was too hot, her face betrayed no sign of it. After a moment she handed it back, answering his questioning eyebrow with a nod. "It's perfect," she intoned, honestly, but she was not to be deterred. "Now sign."

"Ah, ah, ah," Tony wheedled, taking a sip of his own and setting the mug aside. "Am I a genius, or am I a genius?"

To Rhodey's continuing surprise, something resembling amused affection flickered over Pepper's features.

"Yes, Tony, you're a genius. You know you're a genius, and you know that I know you're a genius. You're also obstinate, infantile, and a pain in my ass." Holding up her pen and giving him her patented professional smile, she nodded her head toward the papers.

Taking the pen, Tony let his fingers linger over hers a moment longer than necessary, his eyes traveling down her body as his smile grew. "I certainly could be," he drawled, but bent over the papers to sign at the places she'd marked for him. "Kinky, Potts. I didn't know you had it in you. Well," he handed her the papers and pen back. "So to speak."

Pepper wooshed back toward the stairs without missing a beat. "There are a lot of things about me you don't know, Mr. Stark. Will that be all?"

Tony gaped at her for a moment before recovering and responding smoothly, "For now, Ms. Potts. That will be all." She was out the door before he finished speaking. He didn't turn away until the sound of her heels faded up the stairs.

Shaking his head, Rhodey chuckled. "Man, you guys are something else."

The grin faded from Tony's face immediately and he turned away to start cleaning up from the coffee maker project he'd been fiddling with. "I don't know what you mean," he answered smoothly.

"Yeah, you do." Rhodey helped him move components until the worktable was clear again, and the torso of the Iron Man armor was being lowered within reach. "You like her." Seeing Tony about to respond, Rhodey cut him off. "And not the way you like other women; _all_ women."

Tony disappeared under the armor without comment, and Rhodey moved closer. "You like her so much that in ten years, you've never made a move on her, let alone gotten her into bed with you. And we both know you could do it," he added.

"Pepper's different." His voice was muffled through the wires that separated them. "I need her; not even I'm foolish enough ruin that.

"And you're wrong." He reached toward the table for a wrench. "I've come on to Pepper lots of times."

"Lots of times? General flirting doesn't count."

"… alright, a couple times, then," Tony amended. "I've made a couple serious pass at Pepper, mostly drunk, but she shot me down." He seemed disgruntled, even embarrassed about it.

Rhodey made a face. Tony drunk could range anywhere from charming to downright irritating. "Okay; what _exactly_ have you say to her?"

Tony shifted his weight uncomfortably and didn't answer for a minute. "The usual stuff: 'You have amazing legs, what time do they open?' 'I'm thinking with my dick right now, you wanna blow my mind?' 'That's a nice dress, think I could get into it?' 'If we are what we eat, I could be you by morning…"

Rhodey cringed. "Do those lines ever actually work? No wonder Pepper was freaked out." There were times when being Tony Stark's best friend was more of a job than a privilege. "You're not gonna get a girl like Pepper with shit like that, my friend. You gotta bring your A game."

"You think I haven't tried charming?" Tony was getting tired of this conversation. In truth, he had tried every trick in his bag to get Pepper to notice him, but she seemed immune to the charms that had scored him so many others.

Rhodey shook his head. "Man, you just don't get it. You're treating this like a game, and it's not. You gotta stop being a player and start just being Tony; that's who she's really gonna want."

Tony glared at him from around the suit. "And when did you become Ms. Lonely-Hearts?" Rhodey didn't know what he was talking about.

Flipping him off, Rhodey changed the subject. "Alright, I gotta head out and do some shopping for tomorrow. Are you sure you won't join us for brunch? I gotta keg with your name on it."

"A keg?" Tony was already starting to tune him out, becoming absorbed in his work. "Too pedestrian. Call me when you've upgraded to scotch, then we might have a deal."

Rhodey started a path toward the door, his disappointment palpable. Before making the exit, he stopped and came back. "I'm gonna say two things before I go. One: Whatever your deal is with Christmas, you have got to get over it, man, or one day you're gonna end up a sad, lonely man getting pity fucks like Hugh Heffner."

Surprised at his harshness, Tony, bent to look under the Iron Man's innards. "Don't besmirch the Heff. He's a living legend; an institution." Curious, despite himself, Tony asked. "Alright… what's number two?"

Without a word, Rhodey headed for the door again. It was just as he reached the keypad to punch in his code that he answered. "You're gonna lose her to someone quicker on the draw than you if you don't get off your ass and tell her."

"Tell her what?" Tony called through the glass door as it slowly swung shut behind Rhodey's Air Force blues.

"You know."

Tony frowned, pushing lightly against the armor so that it swung in its rig. He did know what Rhodey meant, but it was something he tried ardently not to think about, when he could help it.

Tony had never been a stupid man, but he was, on occasion, selectively obtuse. It had taken him less than a week to realize that Pepper was indispensable if Stark Industries was going to succeed with Tony at the helm. It had taken him a few months to acknowledge that although he was capable of caring for himself, Pepper did it so much more efficiently than he did.

He'd never bothered to learn how to run a business. Pepper had taught him that, throwing him to the wolves, but jumping right in after him to keep him from wandering too far from the path. In their first year of business after Pepper had been given the promotion of a lifetime, Stark Industries' stock rose 15%, and the company's charitable contributions were unrivaled by any of the other multi-billion dollar corporations.

On top of that, he was eating more regularly, sleeping more than usual, and without having the smaller details of his life to worry about, was working and producing more than ever. It took him no more than a month to acknowledge that she wasn't just indispensable, she was vital.

Tony had never seriously tried to get her into his bed, beyond a few, usually drunken, attempts for the simple reason that he respected her. Pepper Potts, he believed, was in a class of her own, far above the women he used and discarded like tissue. They meant nothing to him, but Pepper had, over the years, become his friend, his advisor, his partner in many ways, as well as his personal and executive assistant.

He'd only realized that he might be in love with her while his head was being held underwater, and it was her voice calling him away from the shadowy fingers of death reaching for him. It was her face he remembered while being beaten and tortured, and that had kept him going even when his chest felt like it was on fire, and his muscles screamed for respite.

And it had been her who entered his mind when Yinsen had called him, "the man who has everything, and nothing."

After Afghanistan, he'd had to reprioritize a lot of things. Wanting her was no question. He'd always wanted her to some extent or another, and he could go on with their flirting that never went anywhere, so long as he had another outlet for his… frustrations. Needing her wasn't new either, as he'd allowed himself to become dependent on her years ago. It was the continuous ache in his chest that had nothing to do with the miniature arc reactor that gave him trouble. Or rather, his new awareness of said ache.

He thought he could get by with her as they were – on all levels – because the truth of the matter was, no matter how much Tony wanted her for himself, no matter how much he continuously discovered that he loved her, he knew better than anyone that Pepper deserved so much more than him.

He was a billionaire; he could give her anything she desired, that his money could buy, and he'd give her everything she wanted if she'd let him. He knew that he was capable of loving her until the day he died. But his reputation, his bouts of selfishness, thoughtlessness, and obsession, his dangerous lifestyle – Pepper deserved someone who wasn't likely to die on her when she least expected it. The way his parents had.

The way _her_ parents had.

So, in a rare burst of consideration, Tony did little more than flirt, linger too long over their touches, and indulge in every opportunity he was able to get close to her. It was masochism of the most psychological kind, but like a flagellant monk, his suffering felt more like penance for the impurity of his thoughts concerning Pepper, and for the fact that he felt only a little guilty for them.

He came out of his reverie when Pepper returned to the workshop, moving more slowly this time. That meant she was checking out for the day, a loss he felt almost physically whenever she left his house.

"I got those contracts sent off, cleared our e-mail as best I could, and put the new parts order through. Do you need anything else before I go?"

Tony imagined, or thought he imagined, that without Rhodey in the room, she came much nearer to him. He didn't want her to leave just yet, but had no real idea for how to get her to stay. "No, Ms. Potts, you've slaved enough for one day. Why don't you sign out, then join me for martinis and a backrub?"

She moved around the lab, picking up dishes and other debris that had accumulated during the day. Without stopping, Pepper made certain her smile had disappeared before she turned around. "I'm not giving you a backrub, Tony," she said, putting a little exasperation into her tone. "Will that be all, Mr. Stark?"

Before he could answer, she was already walking toward the door. "I didn't say the backrub was for me." His ribbing provoked no reaction, spurring him on. "So we're still on for the martinis then? You didn't say no to that." Still no answer, and she had reached the door. "That will be all, Ms. Potts. We'll continue this later."

"I shiver with anticipation," Pepper deadpanned as the door opened for her pneumatically. Stopping, her hand on the glass, she turned back, expression serious. "Tony… are you sure you want to spend Christmas alone again? I know it's not… I know you don't like to celebrate because it reminds you of your parents, but if you like, you're welcome to-"

First Rhodey's lecture, now this – and from the last person on earth he wanted feeling sorry for him. Tony's expression clouded, and he turned back to the armor, his back to her. "Jesus, Pepper, you're off work, you don't need to mollycoddle me in the little free time you get." The spark of irritation flared briefly into a smoldering anger, one that had lurked beneath the surface since his parents' death.

"I'm going to go out. Get drunk. Find something hot and cute – maybe in a blonde, or a redhead… or both." His grin was tight and didn't touch his eyes. "Then I'll spend my night jingling some bells, bringing a little joy to someone's world, and, of course, making the faithful come.

"I don't need you to entertain me, Pep," he turned back to his work. "I can do just fine without your pity." He felt bad about it as soon as the words were out, but pride kept his back to her.

Pepper pursed her lips, counting to ten while her temper flared. "Good night, Mr. Stark." As she disappeared up the stairs, she called back one last time. "Don't forget to deck your halls; wouldn't want you to catch a bug between the holidays."

He listened to the sound of her heels until the door closed, muffling them. "Shit." The wrench he was holding crashed into the far wall and clattered against the ceramic tile floor. Running a hand through his hair, he stared at the armor, wishing for some emergency that would let him blow off some steam. With no alert on his phone to fulfill his request, Tony decided to give up for the moment.

A drink sounded like a far better idea just now.

As he neared the door of his workshop, the lights created distorted reflections on the glass, swirling as he walked closer and closer. But then suddenly, the play of light and shadow seemed to coalesce into a more orderly shape, and Tony stopped, staring.

In a second, it was gone, and Tony shook his head. For a moment, he thought he'd seen the image of Yinsen's face staring back at him from the shiny, delusory surface.

Rubbing his eyes with the heels of his palms, Tony hauled himself up to the kitchen, hoping either alcohol or sleep would dull his senses. He dug around in the back of the cupboard where he kept his hard liquor, and discovered he had one bottle of scotch left. That just might be enough but if not, he could always start on the vodka and get just as stinking drunk as he wanted to.

He really had intended to go out, but now that urge was waning. Maybe the alcohol would restore his enthusiasm for it and he could go find himself some company for the early hours of Christmas morning. It wasn't that Tony wanted to be alone on Christmas, he just wanted to be with people who didn't know him; people who wouldn't look at him with pity, or even sympathy. He couldn't take that, this night of all nights.

Adding ice and scotch to a glass, he practically threw back the first swig, closing his eyes at the smooth, warm slide of the liquid going down his throat. Like a security blanket, something comforting and familiar, the drink began to relax him, even with the first sip. Filling a bucket with ice and taking it, the bottle of scotch, and his glass with him, Tony went to his couch to recline while he drank the first few doses of his favorite medication.

There was a fire going in the round fireplace, set into one of the fat columns supporting the ceiling. Pepper must have lit it, or asked J.A.R.V.I.S. to do so, while she was working. The mental image of Pepper, _his_ Pepper, in his home, and sitting before the fire while she did the work that kept his company going, caused him a twinge of regret, one that Tony accepted and let pass with more alcohol to dull the sharp edges. She was too important to him to lose.

This was no different from any other night where the inevitable thoughts about his assistant crept melancholically into his head in the late hours of the night. The scotch was the same label he always drank, ordered and restocked by Pepper as reliably as the rising sun. The weather was in no way unusual for the hour or time of year.

So, there was no immediate explanation for why Tony suddenly found himself staring back into the face of a man who had saved his life and then died in his arms in a cave in Afghanistan nearly one year ago.

Tony Stark, though he wasn't quite ready to admit it, was an alcoholic. But the few drinks he'd had over the last hour since leaving the workshop were nowhere near enough to render someone with his experience into a state of intoxication severe enough for him to be hallucinating.

Yet, there was no denying the existence of the serene face, with eyes older than his years would allow, looking at him with an expression of deepest concern. It was the same expression Yinsen had been wearing as they'd worked together to swap the car battery protecting his heart for the arc reactor that would change his life.

Leaping to his feet, the bottle of scotch was disturbed from where it rested in the crook of Tony's thighs, toppling to the floor where it bled its contents across the floor. In a blink, the face was gone and Tony was left staring into the flames, wide-eyed and panting in shock. Frantically, he scooped up the liquor bottle, tossing the remaining liquid onto the flames in a thoughtless attempt to douse it.

"Whoa!" He staggered backwards, catching the back of his knees on the couch and falling prone onto it as the fire bloomed outward in reaction to the alcohol. Grabbing up one of the large cushions, Tony charged the fire like a SWAT operative with a security shield. It took him a few minutes to beat the flames out, and by the time he collapsed back on the seat with the cushion on his lap – sooty, singed, and smoking – he was covered in ash and coughing from the smoke.

Rubbing a hand over his face, Tony stared at the fireplace where a few smoldering embers were still glowing red. "Dreaming," he rasped once he could breath. "Must've dozed off…." He didn't quite believe it – he'd seen far too many strange things to not believe that something could be happening here – but the image of Yinsen, whom he'd watched die in the desert in place of Tony himself, struck a nerve that he wasn't yet ready to face.

Pushing himself to his feet and tossing the ruined cushion aside, Tony looked around for the bottle of scotch before remembering its fate. Cursing to himself, he gave it up, deciding that a few hours sleep before he either went out or returned to work were in order. If he was hallucinating, and he certainly wasn't drunk enough for that, then sleep was the best answer.

Tony knew that he should strip and shower before getting into bed, but he couldn't work up the enthusiasm for the effort. Collapsing face first on the bed spread, not bothering to get under the covers, he toed his sneakers off, one at a time, and wiggled into a more comfortable position.

He was almost asleep when the noise began – the rolling, clattering rumble of assault rifles – S.I. G36K's, G36C's, AG36's, and S.I. UMP45's. Tony shot upright again, rolling into a sitting position and looking back at his bedroom door. As usual, he'd closed it, but the sounds of gunfire grew loud and louder as though approaching; as though a small militia were coming up the stairs toward his room.

The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. Tony wondered if he were having some kind of stroke, or a Post Traumatic Stress Disorder episode, like the soldiers he'd occasionally encountered who had never really left the jungles or deserts in which they'd served. He shivered with cold, even though he was still dressed and the room's temperature was carefully regulated by J.A.R.V.I.S.

'_J.A.R.V.I.S.'_

"Jarv," he whispered, never taking his eyes from the door. "Can you give me a visual on the staircase?" When nothing happened after a minute or so, he tried again. "Lights please, J.A.R.V.I.S.?" Again, nothing. Whatever was happening was also affecting his home's artificial intelligence system.

Getting out of bed, Tony looked around his room for something that could be used as a weapon. Except for the lab, most of the rooms in Tony's house were rather Spartan. The suit was downstairs, and Pepper kept everything so organized, that anything useful he might have carried up here, she would have almost immediately carried back down.

He finally grabbed the only thing he could think of to use practically as a weapon: a lamp with a heavy, rectangular base. Yanking the cord from the wall, he stood facing the door, ready to take whatever would come through it, head on.

What it was actually did come _through_ the door, making Tony stagger backward in surprise, dropping the lamp. The figure was faint in the dim light of the room, but no matter how much he blinked to look again, there was no mistaking the small, deceptively strong figure of Ho Yinsen, the doctor who had committed an act so selfless that Tony would spend the rest of his life in repaying it.

Staring wide-eyed at the shape of his friend, his _hero_, Tony gaped, searching for something intelligent to say.

"Who… _what_ the fuck are you?"

Yinsen's familiarly patient smile was like a punch to Tony's gut. "You are going to lose her, Anthony."

He'd heard the same words only a few hours before from Rhodey, but the surrealism of the situation, and the shock of not only seeing Yinsen, but hearing him speak, confused Tony. Frowning, he shook his head. "I don't… I… what?"

"You're going to lose her."

Closing his eyes, Tony rubbed the bridge of his nose. "This is ridiculous." He rolled back on his heels, turning to stagger a few steps away and distance himself from the situation. "This can't be happening."

"You doubt your senses?"

"Maybe I drank more than I thought. Or I've been inhaling more chemicals than normal today, I don't know." Tony was starting to feel a little panicky. "Maybe it was that fucking coffee from the coffee maker I was messing with, or Hell; for all I know, I could be passed out on a floor somewhere, and you the product of a brilliant, but far too often chemically altered, mind."

The door behind Yinsen burst open with a gust of wind, slamming back against the wall with enough force to crack the wall. A gale force hurricane knocked him off his feet, and Tony crab-walked to the safety of the bed, putting himself on the side furthest from the door. The air turned freezing cold, and Tony became aware of a high-pitched keening above the roar, chilling him to the bone.

"Okay! I got it! I got it, just… don't… just make it stop."

As quickly as it began, the wind and air ceased, and for the fourth time that evening, Tony found himself out of breath, gasping for more air. Trying to look composed, he got back to his feet, adjusting his shirt as though it were Armani silk instead of a dirty white muscle shirt.

"So. Yinsen." Tony stared, completely at a loss for words.

Somehow, Yinsen looked amused. "Do you remember what I told you, Anthony? The last thing I asked of you, in return for saving your life?"

The words came from his mouth without though, his voice rough with emotion. "Don't waste it," he answered quietly. "You told me not to waste the second chance I was being given."

Yinsen nodded, moving further into the room. Tony fought the urge to find a chair to offer the older man. He was balanced between approach and retreat, frozen perfectly in place in spite of his nature.

"I am disappointed," Yinsen said, stopping across the bed from Tony. "You have not been doing as I have asked."

"I have!" Finally jolted into motion, Tony moved around the bed to stand by Yinsen. "I've changed the whole focus of my company, I've been doing some real good for the world with the Iron Man thing. I'm practically a different person because of you. How can you say that?"

Yinsen shook his head. "You are still the man who has everything, and nothing. It is true you have made some incredible changes in your life, and that is excellent, and as it should be. But there is one area of your life in which you have abused and ignored what it right in front of you. You will lose her if you do not act, Anthony. That would be a mistake in very many ways."

Tony's first impulse was to do as he usually did and feign ignorance, but this was Yinsen – if he was really here, he had probably come a long way to speak to him. It was only fair he be honest, even if it was to his detriment. "I've tried," he protested quietly, feeling awkward. "She shot me down. Pepper deserves someone much better than me, anyway."

"Anthony," Yinsen said in a familiarly anticipating block. "It is not for you to say what she does or does not deserve. You are a stubborn man; it is not like you to give up on something you truly want after just one try. It will never do. You must try again, and again, if you have to, or more than just the two of you will suffer for it."

Frowning, Tony slowly sat down on the foot of his bed. "What if it's better for her if I just leave well enough alone? What if she'd be happier? Pep already devotes more of her time to me than is probably healthy, and a relationship would only increase the time she spends taking care of me." He shook his head. "No. I've thought about this a lot, Yinsen. She can do better than a neurotic mess like me."

Yinsen's frame seemed to swell, and the room grew colder. Tony felt a chill that had nothing to do with the temperature. The mysterious wind began to rise again, and Tony reached for a pillow, as though it would protect him.

"It is as I feared," Yinsen's voice deepened dramatically and returned to normal in the same moment, like sound echoing off mountains in to a valley. "Just as stubborn as ever you were. Very well – you leave me no choice."

"Um," Tony didn't like the sound of that. "No choice about what?"

"Tonight, you will be visited by three spirits," Yinsen said, his voice grim with purpose.

"I – " The pillow fell from Tony's hands to the floor. "Three spirits… I don't suppose you're talking about vodka, scotch, and rum, are you?" Yinsen continue to stare at him, and Tony ran a hand through his hair, blowing air between pursed lips. "Tonight, you said?"

"Expect the first spirit when the bell tolls one." A screen appeared on one of the windows – the digital read-out of an analogue clock, it's alarm set for and hour from now, at one o'clock. "Expect the second when the bell chimes two, and the last on the third hour of morning."

"Wait, they're coming one at a time?" Somehow this seemed the worse option. "What, there's no group rate?"

"Goodbye once more, Anthony. Remember that opportunity is not a lengthy visitor, and that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. You have been granted the remarkable gift of perspective in order to live the life the universe feels you deserve. Do not waste it, Anthony. For your sake, and hers, do not waste it."

Tony jumped as the room sprang to life, the stock ticker above his dresser shone luminescent, and the HUD screens displayed the time, temperature, and all the other information he wanted close at hand. Looking around, it took him a moment to realize that Yinsen was gone and once again, Tony was alone.

Almost.

"J.A.R.V.I.S.?"

"Yes, Mr. Stark?"

"You didn't note anything… anomalous happening in the past hour?"

"No, sir." The A.I. paused. "Are you quite all right, Anthony? I'm registering an elevated pulse, and – "

"Everything's fine." Tony rubbed his face hard. "Except I may be going crazy."

"Studies do show that persons with I.Q. levels in the highest percentile often suffer from mental disorders, ranging in degrees of severity from mild depression to acute schizophrenia –Michealangelo Buonarroti, Nikola Tesla, Howard Hughes – "

"Thank you, J.A.R.V.I.S., for that… inspiring vote of confidence. Lights out, please. I need to sleep some very weird things away."

"Of course, sir. Good night, and pleasant dreams."

Tony didn't answer, he was already asleep, with thoughts of visiting spirits buried far from his mind.


	2. Chapter 2

**An Iron Man Christmas Carol ~**

**A Love Story**

_Stave the Second_

_In which the protagonist of our story is visited by the first of three spirits, and is reminded of his past mistakes._

He woke suddenly, and the illuminated numbers floating on the bedroom wall told him that it was midnight.

The house was silent and Tony wasn't sure what had woken him, but he was about to get out of bed when he remembered Yinsen, and his promise of three ghostly visitors.

The first, Yinsen had said, would come at one o'clock, and Tony frowned, looking again at the glowing numbers. It had been after midnight already when he'd gone to sleep – hadn't it? Maybe he had dreamt the whole episode, and had just been working too hard lately. That was possible. Maybe the holidays were stirring up strange things in his mind because why would Yinsen, or anyone, come to him from beyond the grave to discuss his relationship with Pepper? It seemed ridiculous.

More likely, it was Tony's subconscious mind translating his own desires into some sense of urgency, his need for Pepper heightened by his want. He lay there as the minutes ticked past, thinking about Yinsen, and what such a dream could have possibly meant. He _wanted_ Pepper, there was no question about that. That he loved her, he was certain. But there were men better than he who actually deserved someone as good as she was, whereas Tony knew he didn't.

A quarter past the hour – what if, as he sometimes suspected, Pepper loved him, too?

Half past the hour – If she loved him, did she also want him? The two weren't mutually exclusive. Could she want to be with him?

A quarter till – Even if she did love him, she still deserved better and must think so herself, since she'd never said anything. Right?

As the hour itself approached, Tony grew still, listening intently to the darkness around him. At 12:59, he began to feel foolish. Nothing was going to happen, he had imagined the whole thing. He should probably think about drinking less so that things like thi-

"If you had listened to me when you were young, you would never have started drinking in the first place. I did warn you about our family's penchant for substance abuse."

Tony held his breath. He wanted to turn and look at the speaker, but he was filled with a conflicting mixture of hope and dread at the sound of that familiar voice, one he hadn't heard since he was twenty-one years old.

"Well, what are you waiting for? Get up; we've got a lot to accomplish, and not much time to do it."

Turning his head in the direction of the voice, Tony saw what he hadn't hoped to expect. Howard Anthony Stark stood looking out of the large windows on one side of Tony's bedroom. From the rotunda at the topmost level of the mansion, one could see far out into the Pacific from three-quarters of the round, and on a clear day, all the way to Los Angeles in the remaining quarter. His father was staring out of the eastward-facing section and even in his shock, Tony was curious to know what had captured his attention.

Standing slowly Tony stared at his father, having a hard time believing what was before his eyes. "Dad?" He stepped closer to see him better.

Howard turned to look at his son, his face without expression as his eyes scanned Tony's figure. "Close your mouth, son, you'll catch flies," he said mildly. "In spite of your drinking, you appear to be in good health. It would seem that girl is good for you in many ways."

Tony's mouth snapped shut. Feeling ten-years old again, he moved even closer to his ghostly father. "So, you're the spirit I was told to expect?" he asked, ignoring his father's reference to Pepper.

"Yes," Howard nodded. "My appearing here would be a sizable coincidence if I wasn't, wouldn't it? I'm your Ghost of Christmas Past. Come along; we've a lot to see."

"I don't understand," Tony shook his head, thinking back to Yinsen and trying to make sense of his haunting. "Why are you here? Not that it isn't good to see you, but- "

Howard gave his son a tolerant smirk. "Your welfare, of course."

The expression on his father's face, and the almost condescending tone of his voice stiffened Tony's spine; an autonomic reflex of old habit. He scowled. "It's a little late to be worried about that now, isn't it? The lost sleep would do me better."

"Your reclamation then." Howard gave Tony a censuring look without verbally commenting on his son's attitude. Get a move on, Anthony." He made an impatient gesture, and after another defiant moment, Tony came to his father's side.

"Alright, alright. What is it we have to do?" Tony was careful not to touch his father, unsure whether it would have disturbed him more if the man were tangible, or not.

Howard shook his head. "Not 'we', son – you. It's what _you _have to do that's important. I'm only here to show you."

Frowning in confusion, Tony followed the spirit toward the balcony door. "Fine. What are you showing me?" Howard didn't immediately answer, looking down over the side of the balcony to the beach below, then to the sky above them.

"Wait," Tony stopped in the doorway. "We're not going out that way, are we? People have predicted I'll fall over a balcony, but if that's the way I'm gonna go, I'd rather not do it sober – it's slightly less embarrassing."

"Just take my hand, you'll be fine," Howard said, sounding more scornful than reassuring. "And I've already told you what I'm here to show you: Christmas past."

"Great," Tony grumbled. "Thanks for clearing that up." He stepped outside, still uncertain, and looked from his father's outstretched hand to his face once. "Really?" Tony asked incredulously before reluctantly taking his hand.

Howard Stark only smirked in response before they were taken up by what seemed like a tornado, sucking them up into the stillness of the eye. They were flying, but it was unlike any mode of air travel Tony had done before, fast and dizzying, but still at the same time, and occasionally he could pick out landmarks below them, randomly, like images in a magic-eye picture.

Then it was all over. Before Tony had time to react, he and his father were standing on a paved road amid hulking, Colonial-style, brick buildings. There were only a handful of people moving carefully over the icy walkways on their way to more large buildings stretching away from them.

Calls of Merry Christmas echoed off banks of snow, pushed to one side by early morning snowplows, and as Tony looked around, he realized he knew this place; he knew these people.

"It's M.I.T.," he breathed, stunned. "It's M.I.T. from when I went to school here." The hair and clothing of the few people nearby bespoke an earlier time than the one they'd left, and a flyer taped to a lamppost confirmed that it was one in which a seventeen-year old Tony had just begun two Master's programs, which he would complete two years later.

As Tony looked around in amazement, Howard watched his son. He ignored the uncharacteristic tears that had risen emotively in Tony's eyes. "You usually came home for Christmas," he said. "Except for one year. This one."

Nodding absently, Tony thought back to the year he'd stayed on campus for Christmas. "You and mom went to Venice," he said without looking at his father. He wiped his tears away roughly with the palm of his hand. "I told myself I was giving you the opportunity to go by not coming home, but you would have gone with or without me."

Howard didn't confirm or deny. "You had your own reasons." When Tony nodded again, frowning at the ground, Howard said, "Where would you be right now?"

With a tightness in his chest, Tony started walking. "One of only three places," he answered.

The library was an enormous building, its shape reminiscent of the White House. Two wings, east and west, flanked a taller, domed building. The shelves and paneling inside were a dark, high-gloss oak, and reflected the warm orange glow from the desktop Tiffany lamps scattered around the room.

On a leather, overstuffed chair to one side of the central rotunda, a teenaged Tony Stark sat with his feet pulled up under him, surrounded by half a dozen textbooks. One lay open on his lap, and he was reading so intently, it explained why the normally fidgety boy was completely still, all except one hand, in which a pen twirled between quick fingers.

Stopping suddenly, the older Tony moved to hide behind one of the square pillars supporting the balcony of the upper story.

"What are you doing?"

"I don't want them to seem me. Isn't there some rule about that?"

Howard rolled his eyes, grabbing Tony's arm and pulling him out. "These are just shadows of things that have already happened. We're just here to watch, like a movie. They can neither see us nor hear us."

Yanking his arm out of his father's hand, Tony glared mildly before returning his attention to his younger self. A circle of young men sitting on chairs and couches in the center of the room had drawn the attention of a librarian, who asked them to quiet down. One of their number stood up and stretched before making his way over to where Tony sat.

"Hey, Tone!" a young James Rhodes called out, earning another "shhh" from the librarian. He waved in apology and lowered his voice. "Hey, roomie – why don't you come sit with us? You wanna study yourself to death, hey, that's your choice. But you got the rest of the year for that shit; right now, you should give it a rest. At least on Christmas, man!"

Tony didn't even look up. "Sorry, Platypus, no can do. I've got two degree programs to finish, and I'd like to get out of school before I'm old enough to drink."

Rhodey shook his head, perching on the arm of Tony's chair, making him shift to accommodate him. "Look, I get it. You're an overachiever, and a genius. Even here in a school full of overachieving geniuses, you're in a class all your own. But at least be man enough to admit the real reason you're so gung-ho about getting ahead on your studies."

Looking up at last, Tony raised an eyebrow in a pale reflection of the sardonic expression it would grow into in later years. "And what, pray tell, would that be?"

The tight knot returned to the older Tony's chest, and he turned to look at the door, the same moment that Rhodey looked the same direction.

"Speak of the devil," Rhodey murmured, making the younger Tony look, too. A young woman had entered, wearing a knee-length gold sheath of a dress with spaghetti straps. A fur-lined short jacket and matching hat protected her from the cold outside, and the high-heeled boots she looked all but poured into, were also lined with fur.

At the sight of her, the younger Tony lit up, an enormous, almost worshipful expression on his face. "Sunset," he called to her quietly.

The older Tony wasn't as thrilled. "Sunset," he echoed his younger self in a much harsher voice. He turned to his father, angrily. "This is what we came here to see? Sunset Bain? I already know what I did wrong there – I started liking her in the first place."

"You didn't like her," Howard corrected. "You _loved_ her."

Setting his jaw, Tony didn't answer. His face said it all.

Sunset turned at the sound of her name and smiled at the sigh of the young Tony. She was clearly older than him by about five years, but didn't hesitate to pluck the book out of Tony's hands and seat herself in his lap. Trailing a sculpted, French manicured nail along his jaw, she cooed to him in a buttery warm voice. "Anthony. I was hoping I'd find you here. Can I convince you to have dinner with me?"

The younger Tony grinned, looking more like his older self than he had since they'd first spotted him. "For you, darling? I'd go anywhere you wanted me to."

Both the younger Rhodey and the older Tony rolled their eyes. Howard remained quiet, watching the scene unfold.

"I was so hoping you'd say that, baby." Sunset's voice lowered seductively, and she leaned in to kiss him, holding his head in place by pressing two hands worth of her fingers into his hair.

Rhodey cleared his throat and got up. "I'll leave you kids to it. Curfew's still at eleven, roomie."

Sunset smiled as she broke the kiss, but she never turned to look at Rhodey. "I'll have baby home in time for his bedtime story, Mother," she said lightly, using her thumb to clean the transferred lipstick from Tony's mouth. "Don't fret."

Seeing that Tony wasn't going to respond, Rhodey returned to his original group, shaking his head.

Howard turned his attention from the younger Tony to the elder. "You loved her," he repeated.

The older Tony watched his younger self grimly as Sunset coaxed him to his feet and let him gather his books. "Yes, I loved her. She wasn't the first girl I loved, but Sunset was… my first great love. I would have done anything for her."

"You practically did," Howard commented heavily.

Closing his eyes, Tony took a deep breath even as his jaw set in anger. "Yes. I did. I was much more naïve then. Stupider. I trusted her completely. People say I'm paranoid, but I learned that lesson well, thanks to Sunset."

Tony looked at his dad, a child-like vulnerability entering his eyes. "You know, to this day, I can't remember how it came up – giving her your security codes for Stark Industries. We were talking about trust… I think she said something about… my giving her your codes was a sign that I really trusted her. That she could only marry me if she felt that I trusted her as much as she trusted me." He was quiet for a moment. "I never told you I proposed to her, did I?"

"No, you didn't." Howard said. "What did she say?"

"She didn't," Tony watched his younger self walk with Sunset toward the exit. "A few days after I gave her the codes, she broke up with me. Couldn't give me a reason, just… 'It's over'. It was just a couple days later that Stark Industries was robbed. I should have thought of Sunset right away, but," looking at his father, Tony shrugged. "The company was your deal then, not mine, and I was already back at school, nursing a broken heart. I would never have believed Sunset was responsible for the thefts."

"When did you find out?"

Tony sighed heavily. "When Baintronics opened a year later." As the young couple left library, Tony turned toward his father. "What was the point of showing me this? It's only reminded me that no one is trustworthy enough to let into your life close enough that they can see the real you. They'll only exploit you."

"Even Pepper?" Howard challenged.

Opening his mouth to respond automatically, Tony stopped as he actually considered the question. "No," he said quietly after a moment. "It's not just the length of time we've worked together; I… I know Pepper."

Howard nodded as if he knew some deep philosophical secret. "In fact, of all the people you know, she's the _only_ one you trust completely, isn't she?"

Tony didn't answer. He didn't have to.

"After Sunset, you started to change," Howard said. "You stopped studying for tests, you started drinking, and you began your campaign to sleep with every woman you met."

"I was seventeen," Tony said with a glare. "And I was in college. It was a time of experimentation."

"That you've never grown out of." Howard said sternly.

Facing his father, Tony's eyes flashed angrily. "Alright, so what? I still got the highest marks in my graduating class, and if I want to get wasted, the only person I'm hurting is myself. I never drank and drove then, and I never lied to the women I slept with – I made no promises I knew I wouldn't keep, and they knew what they were getting into when they got into my bed. It's the same policy I abide by now."

"_Do_ they really understand most of them will only have a few hours with you before being sent away? You loved Sunset, but you let her betrayal poison you." Howard said. "You built a wall around your heart that no one could get into, and turned into a selfish, alcoholic, billionaire playboy, who cares about nothing and no one but himself."

Tony stared hard at his father for a long moment. "I'm done. Take me home." He walked past Howard toward the same door his younger self had just left through.

Howard shook his head. "We aren't done yet." Grabbing Tony's arm, once again they were swept up into the eerie stillness, like the center of a tornado, as the world passed rapidly beneath them.

Before Tony could protest, Howard was releasing his arm, sending him spiraling into a wall. Recovering himself, Tony turned angrily toward his father and stopped short when he saw where they were.

People surrounded them on all sides, dressed to the nines and nearly elbow to elbow with one another. At one end of the room on an elevated platform, a live band played everything from classical to hip-hop, with familiar Christmas tunes interspersed. Couples danced in the front portion of the room, while the back half was given over to a bar, buffet, and series of smaller tables, where more guests congregated to talk.

"It's Stark Industries," Tony said, more to himself than his father.

Howard responded anyway. "Yes; ten years ago, to be exact. Do you know why we're here?"

Tony had been on the verge of asking that himself. "No, I-"

He stopped short, seeing Pepper, ten years younger than he'd last seen her, being led off the dance floor by a tall man with sandy blond hair. The man pulled her by the hand, heading Tony and Howard's direction.

Pepper's red hair was piled atop her head, the golden hues catching the lights. She was dressed in a deep green, sleeveless, charmeuse gown with braided detail that swept just under her breasts in an empire waist, then up around her neck in a sweetheart halter neckline. Both the bust and length of the gown were pleated, and beneath the skirt, a pair of gold, open-toed shoes peeked out as she walked. In her ears, she wore a simple pair of pearl stud earrings, but they weren't necessary to make her any more beautiful, or elegant.

She took Tony's breath away.

Tony had known from the first moment he laid eyes on her that Virginia Potts was a beautiful woman. Looking at her now though, he had to question his sanity for not falling in love with her sooner.

"She's beautiful," he breathed quietly.

Howard was watching Pepper as well as she and her companion stopped no more than three feet away from them. "She is," he agreed. "Not your usual type though, is she?"

Tony raised an eyebrow, glancing from Pepper back to his father. "I wasn't aware I had a 'type'. I'm not exactly selective."

"No," Howard nodded. "You're hardly picky. But this young lady is different in one very important way."

Before Tony could inquire further, he heard Pepper's voice raised in frustration. He tuned into her conversation with the young man.

"I've told you a hundred times, Roger, there is nothing going on between Mr. Stark and I," Pepper said, placating. She was trying to remain calm and reasonable, but Tony had known her long enough to recognize the glint of temper in her eyes. "Let's just go now, alright? We can talk about this more in private."

Roger wasn't to be deterred. "I'm not blind, Ginny," he argued. "I saw the way he was looking at you when the two of you went to welcome the guests. He stared at your ass more than he looked at the audience."

"He's drunk," Pepper had turned slightly pink with embarrassment, something her companion clearly noticed. "You know his reputation, and I've told you how he can be sometimes."

"Then why do you stay?" Roger wrapped a hand around her upper arm. "We've been dating for two years, and until you got your promotion six months ago, everything was wonderful. But since you started working for Tony Stark, you've changed, Gin. I used to be the most important part of your life; now you work fifteen hours a day, sometimes more. You always answer the phone when Stark calls you, no matter if we're on a date, or if it's three o'clock in the morning, or if we're about to have sex!"

Roger raised a hand to stop Pepper from interrupting when she opened her mouth to reply. "Let me finish. I love you, Ginny. But I can't help feeling like Stark is purposefully monopolizing your attention to get in between you and me."

"That's crazy!" Pepper protested. "Roger, I know I've been incredibly busy in my new job lately, but being Mr. Stark's assistant isn't easy. He's got a million and ten things going at once, and he hired me to keep track of all of it so that he can focus on what keeps his business afloat: the creation of the new weapons and all the hundreds of other things he's famous for.

"I stay because I find the work rewarding, and Mr. Stark needs someone he can trust to help run his business. It doesn't mean that there's anything more than that going on." Extracting her arm from his grasp, Pepper took Roger's hand. "I'm just an employee – nothing more. I would think you, of all people, could understand late hours."

"Yes, but I'm an attorney. I'm keeping people out of jail, not typing memos."

"Are you saying your job's more important than mine? That just because your job is more prestigious, you're entitled to be devoted to it, but since I'm just a 'glorified secretary', I'm not?"

"I never said that," Roger snapped. "I'm sure the work you do is very important, I just don't see why it takes up every minute of your day." Roger made a sour face. "He even gave you a nickname; what does he call you, Penny? Poppy?"

"Pepper," she huffed, patience waning. "I can't make apologies for who he is," she said, her voice dangerously quiet. "Only for what I do. I'm sorry I've been working so much, and that we don't get to see one another as often, but I love my job, and it's important to _me_. Maybe it isn't glamorous, or easy, but I work so hard at it because it matters to _me_.

"Mr. Stark is my employer," she continued. "We work closely together, and maybe we could even be considered friends, but that's all."

Roger stared at her for a moment. "I don't get why it's so important," he said easily. "The man uses you – he works you like a dog, and makes you do things a personal slave would do."

"That _isn't_ true," Pepper said through her teeth. "I don't do anything against my will, and he would never make me. He's really a good man, beneath the façade, but helping him doesn't mean we're-"

Pepper stopped suddenly and once more, Tony found himself faced with a younger version of himself. This time though, he couldn't remember the scene being enacted before him. Tony frowned as he watched himself stumble drunkenly past Pepper and her date, stop short, then swerve back around to accost his assistant.

"Pepper," the drunken Tony slurred. "You're looking… very sexy. Come dance with me."

Pepper looked between her boss and her boyfriend, alarmed. "Um. Mr. Stark, I don't think- "

"Come on." Tony didn't appear to have even heard Pepper's protest, taking her by the hand and drawing her across the room to the dance floor. Pepper looked back at Roger a little helplessly, holding up one finger to say she'd sort this out and be back in a minute.

The older Tony groaned; this wouldn't be good. He wanted to see what Roger would do, but he was equally curious about this moment with Pepper he couldn't remember. Fortunately, he didn't have to choose. After a surprised pause, Roger followed Tony and Pepper to the dance floor, stopping fifteen feet away to watch as Tony pulled Pepper against him, dancing with his arms low around her waist, their faces only inches apart.

Tony and his father moved closer to the couple, keeping an eye on Roger, but eager to hear the dancing couple's exchange.

" –isn't a good idea," Pepper was saying, one hand on Tony's shoulder, but the other against his chest as if to push him away. "Please let me return to my date before…" she hesitated, not sure of the best thing to say. "Before my boyfriend gets more upset."

"Boyfriend?" the younger Tony rumbled, one hand moving steadily in the direction of Pepper's ass. "I didn't know you were seeing anyone, Ms. Potts. That might make things difficult when you come home with me tonight."

"Mr. Stark," Pepper said sternly, grabbing Tony's wrist and relocating his hand back up to her hip. "I'm not going home with you, and you know it."

Tony's grin was lazy and seductive. Turning his face in toward her neck, he didn't make contact with Pepper's skin, but he was close enough that the warmth of his breath caressed it for him.

To the older Tony's surprise, Pepper's eyes fluttered closed and she shuddered at the feel of his breath, so briefly that if he hadn't been watching her so closely, Tony would have missed it. Not twenty feet away, Roger's scowl deepened, as if he had noticed it too.

"You're gorgeous," younger Tony murmured, inhaling her scent. "I want to lick every inch of your body; I bet you taste fantastic. Mm…" his eyes fell closed as he thought about it. Pepper jumped as his suddenly very prominent erection brushed against her thigh.

Inhaling a quick breath, Pepper put both her hands on Tony's shoulders and stepped back out of the circle of his arms. "That's enough," she said firmly. "There are scores of women here who'd take you up on your offer. Why don't you go find one of them?"

Younger Tony wrapped large hands around Pepper's wrists and tugged her against him again, putting her arms around his neck. He ignored her question. "Kiss me… I know you want to, Pepper. You owe me at least that."

Pepper pushed him arm-length again, but he didn't release her. Her eyes flashed angrily. "What the hell does that mean?"

"Your promotion," Pepper was holding herself so stiffly that Tony couldn't pull her against him again. He settled instead for trying to run his hands over her body. "You're making four times what you were making in Accounting. You get to travel with me all over the world. Some of the most powerful, and famous people in the world know your name, and you owe it all to me."

"Oh, God…" Older Tony covered his face with his hands.

They were no longer dancing, if that's what their slow, awkward shuffle had been called. Pepper managed to fend off Tony's wandering hands with her own more dexterous ones, but with her attention focused on doing that, Tony was easily able to start backing her toward one of the darker corners of the room.

"And, I can think of a number of ways you can pay me back," Tony continued in a husky voice. He stumbled a little, nearly falling into Pepper, but she had lifted her hands to push him away again, and caught his weight. Tony recovered his footing, but made no effort to draw back from the proximity his trip had brought them to. Pepper's gasp made him chuckle. "You owe it to me to let me show you how. It'll be fun. You do like fun, don't you, Ms. Potts?"

Tony drew in, aiming for a deep, if inebriated kiss. Though he was drunk, Pepper had seen drunken Tony kiss enough times to know that it still would have been mind shattering – due to what amounted to an enormous amount of practice in becoming a World Class lover – and for just a moment, it looked as though Pepper was going to let him do it. Her eyes fluttered closed and she took in a deep, anticipatory breath – but then her eyes opened, and there was no mistaking the fury in them.

With a surprising amount of strength, Pepper held her ground and pushed him away, and when she spoke, her voice was steely. "Stop it, Tony. You're wasted." She gathered up her dress so she wouldn't step on it. "And I quit."

Staring at her in shock, Tony abruptly burst into slightly hysterical laughter. "You can't quit. I don't accept."

Throughout their exchange, Tony and Pepper had managed to draw little attention to themselves. Those who had looked their way with curiosity were employees, and therefore familiar with both their boss's inebriated antics, and the rumors about he and his assistant. It wasn't until a series of things happened in quick succession, though, that the attention of the entire room turned to them.

First, the band chose that moment to take a break, so there was no music masking the sound of Pepper's hand as it made contact with Tony's face. Before his head had time to snap back, Tony was forcibly turned around to face a seething Roger, whose punch sent him staggering back into Pepper. She caught him again, her anger suddenly focused not on Tony, but her boyfriend.

"Roger!" she exclaimed in outrage, not moving until Tony had recovered his feet, rubbing his jaw. Stepping between the two men, she lowered her voice to address her boyfriend. "Everything's under control, I can fight my own battles, just, please, stay out of this. For me."

Before he could respond, Rhodey appeared from the crowd, still moving at a gallop from running down the stairs from the second story. Just as Pepper had done, he kept his voice modulated low enough so that it could be heard by their small circle of people, but would not extend to anyone else over the din of speculative conversation and budding gossip. He'd run this drill before. "What the hell is going on here?"

"Tony's drunk," Pepper commented simply, only looking away from Roger for a second to give Rhodey a look that communicated much more than her words.

Roger was not of a mind to keep his voice low. "Drunk?" he roared angrily, reducing the crowd's noise considerably. Ignoring Rhodey completely, he kept all his attention on Pepper and the man behind her. "He was practically mauling you! Why the hell are you protecting him?"

"I'm not protecting him, I've got it under control," she ground out through her teeth, looking quickly to see how many eyes were focused on them. All of them were. Pepper lowered her voice further. "I appreciate your concern, Roger, but I can handle Mr. Stark on my own."

Tony, despite the pain in his jaw, which he was rubbing with one hand, was smirking at Roger like the proverbial cat who'd found the cream. "She's going to handle me," he taunted, not caring in the least who overheard them. "Which means I'll be handling her." He snaked his arms around Pepper's waist from behind, splaying his hands across her stomach as his mouth automatically dove for her neck.

Whipping around to face him, Pepper needed to lean back so that her face wasn't too close to his. Of course, this pushed up her breasts up between them, and Tony grinned like an idiot, openly staring at her chest.

"Enough." Pepper snapped firmly at Tony, and maybe it was the familiar business-like quality of her voice that made him cease moving. His eyes met hers and for the first time that night, she saw in them the part of Tony he never intended anyone to see, even her. That she so readily recognized it was tribute, both to her observational skills, and the stunning amount of patience she had for him.

The tension drained from her shoulders as her anger settled into something less potent. Taking his hands from her back, she stepped out of the circle of his arms and away from him. For a moment, Tony stared at her like a lost little boy. He was still incredibly drunk, but it looked as though Pepper's voice had injected a little reality to their situation.

Opening his mouth to speak, Tony never got the chance to. Roger stormed over to Pepper and grabbed her hand, giving it a sharp tug.

"We're leaving," he demanded, attempting to pull her away. "Now."

Pepper tried to pull her hand away, no more amused at being manhandled by Roger than she had been by Tony. "Not yet," she answered firmly. "I have to make sure Mr. Stark is taken care of, first." Turning to Rhodey to ask him to see Tony safely home, she was interrupted by Roger as well as he pulled her around to face him, his expression a twisted rictus of jealous and anger.

"You've been lying to me," He growled in a voice that grew steadily louder. The effects of his own drinking, making his eyes shiny. Pepper's eyes widened in surprise. "You are fucking your boss, aren't you?" Another ripple of noise wound it's way around the room. "So, does he use you when there's no other pussy to be found? Is that why he calls you at all hours? Or is he paying you to take care of those needs, too? That would explain how you afford your apartment – I'd wondered about that. Does he pay for that and keep you there till he needs an emergency slut?"

Absolutely turning red with embarrassment and rage, Pepper had tears in her eyes by the time Roger was done. Before she could respond though, a voice came from behind her, sounding even angrier than she felt.

"Hey!" Tony stepped around Pepper to get in Roger's face. "You don't speak to her that way. Who do you think you fucking are, insinuating things like that about Pepper like she's just some whore? What kind of man are you?" He looked around for another scotch, figuring he was going to need one.

Roger pushed Tony hard in the chest, following after him the few feet he traveled. "How I talk to _Virginia_ is none of your damn business, Stark. In the six months since she started working for you, I haven't seen her once on a weeknight before eleven o'clock. I'm not stupid – what else would keep her 'at work' fifteen hours a day, unless she's tucking you in at night and getting some action? I know she's a great lay, but she certainly hasn't been getting it from me lately."

Pepper's horrified gasp and surge forward were all but lost beneath the flurry of noise and action that was Tony Stark. Letting out a roar that the Celts would have described as a battle cry, he leapt at Roger, taking him to the ground. The other man tried to fight back, but the berserker rage animating Tony gave Roger no opening.

Practically sitting on Roger's chest, Tony slammed a fist into the prone man's face hard enough that Roger's head snapped right as it was pounded into the floor. Someone in the room screamed and people everywhere started talking, some excitedly, some distressed.

Spinning around, Pepper made eye contact with one of the band members and raised her hand in a signal for the music to resume immediately. The drummer got the message and soon a swing-style rendition of _'Jingle Bell Rock'_ filled the room.

In the meanwhile, Rhodey had thrown himself on Tony, struggling to pull him off of Roger before any real damage was done. Tony eventually staggered to his feet, panting and still battling feebly against Rhodey's grip.

"Let me go, Platypus," Tony huffed, staring daggers at Roger. He was sweating profusely. "This isn't your fight."

Rhodey held firm. "It's not yours either, Tone. Let's just calm down and we can sort this all out rationally." At last Tony went limp, and Rhodey released the arms he'd had pinned in back.

Without hesitation, Tony turned around and threw a mean left hook at Rhodey.

Roger sat up slowly, blood gushing from his nose. "I'm gonna sue your ass off, Stark!" He threatened thickly, his words distorted by an obviously broken nose and possibly a fractured jaw.

"Of course you'd want my ass," Tony replied cheekily.

As Roger tried to struggle to his feet, Tony wiped the sweat and blood flecks from his face and turned around to look for Pepper.

He was met with a punch in the face from Rhodey, who hit Tony, then adjusted his jacket, calmly. Looking to Pepper, who was standing out of the way, shock written on her face as she muttered to herself, calculating how much they'd be spending in repairs, clean up, doctors bills, lawyer's fees and settlements.

"Can't deal with spin tonight," she said with a heavy sigh. Watching Tony recover from getting punched, she stepped in front of him, just as he was making for Rhodey with clenched fists.

"That's enough," she said, so softly that no one but Tony could have heard her.

Blinking down at her in confusion, Tony dropped his hands to his sides, quiescent again.

"I'm gonna call in Happy to take him home," Rhodey said quietly to Pepper, who nodded.

She didn't even glance at Roger as she told Rhodey, "I'll make sure he gets back safely; if you don't mind settling things here?"

He looked like he wanted to protest her going home with Tony after his behavior toward her, but his innate trust in Pepper's intelligence and her expertise on all matters Tony, silenced Rhodey. "No, I don't mind. Just tell me what I've gotta do and…" he glanced at his best friend who was staring at the floor and wobbling in place. "Make sure he doesn't choke on his own vomit."

"You're going home with him?" Roger shrieked, drawing attention toward them again.

Pepper looked at him without expression, her business mask keeping her held together for the moment. She didn't answer, instead putting a hand on Tony's back as Rhodey went to summon their driver and saying quietly, "Come on, Mr. Stark. Let's get you home."

She put her arm around his waist to help him walk steadily, and Tony, instead of bracing himself with an arm across his assistant's shoulders, slung his low around her waist like they were on a date, not in the middle of a PR nightmare.

"Knew you couldn't resist," he mumbled to Pepper as they headed for the exit. "I'm going to eat you out until dawn; see how many times I can make you come before I'm even inside you."

"Oh, shut up," Pepper grumbled. The soft, quick intake of breath and even softer flush that crept down her décolletage before she spoke though, said something completely different.

The older Tony and his spectral father watched Tony and Pepper leave, his expression hard with anger, embarrassment, and shame. "I… don't remember any of that," he admitted, following his younger self to see him herded into his limo. "It's not the first thing I've forgotten things while drunk though, and it wasn't the last."

"No," Howard agreed, now focused entirely on the man at his side. "But this one is significant, for several reasons. Can you tell me why?"

Resisting the urge to retort sharply about not having been a student for many years, Tony went over everything again in his mind, searching for something that would have drawn them here to witness this. "I've only made a few serious attempt to sleep with Pepper – or so I thought. This is one I can't remember." He made a face. "I'm far better at seduction when I'm sober. Or at least, more sober."

"Hm," was Howard's only comment. "You saw the way she responded to you a few times? In spite of the fact that she was unequivocally saying 'no'?"

"Yes," he couldn't help feeling smug. "She wanted me."

"But she turned you down," Howard pointed out. "Even though she was attracted to you and even though you were making an ass of yourself – she even chose to take care of you instead of the man she'd been dating for two years. But in ten years, she has never faltered on that point and given in. Why would she deny herself what she wants and could easily have?"

Tony tried to be offended at his father's insinuation that he was easy, but even he had to admit that he was accurate. His expression darkened again and he stared at the party continuing around them, pensively. "I know that I'm not good enough for her," he eventually responded. "Even if she has wanted me all this time, she obviously feels she deserves better, and she's right."

Howard looked at him in silence for a moment, a faint smile on his lips like he knew an impressive secret. "She's very patient with you," was all he said.

"Not usually," Tony snorted. "She can be frightening when she's truly angry, but when she's all riled up she's stunning."

"Isn't she patient with you?" The shadows of the past flickered once more to images without sound of Pepper slapping him one minute, exasperated forgiveness in her eyes the next.

Not looking at his father, Tony stared at the ground. "It's her job to take care of me," he said.

"It almost wasn't after this night."

Tony lifted his head quickly. "You're right; she quit." He frowned. "I wonder why she didn't leave? Anyone else… well, anyone else would have quit within the first two weeks. After my… extraordinarily shameful behavior, why did she stay?"

Howard's smile grew. "Come. We have one shadow more."

"I don't think I can stand anymore of these sort of memories," Tony said, going to his father nonetheless. "Besides, I know better than anyone that physical attraction isn't love; I'm not going to pursue something more with her based on just that." He hesitated to continue. "I don't want sex with Pepper. Well, no, I mean, of course I want to have sex with Pepper, but I don't want _just_ sex. I want _her_; all of her. I'm not a saint, I'd take whatever she was willing to give, but none of that is enough if her heart isn't part of the deal. It would just hurt too much. She's worth much more than one night, no matter how fantastic it is.

Holding out his hand to his son, Howard said nothing, but he was still smiling.

They didn't travel far. When Tony looked around to get his bearing, he found that they were in the bedroom of his Malibu mansion, and judging by the clothing, it was the same night. Frowning, Tony glanced curiously at his father, who kept his eyes trained on the other pair.

Pepper led Tony to his dresser and made sure he was steady before leaving his side, heading for the bathroom. "Get undressed," she ordered. The younger Tony smirked but he'd barely opened his mouth when Pepper called out in the same flat voice, "And you can keep whatever lewd comments you're about to make to yourself, Mr. Stark." Tony shut his mouth again, but he continued to smirk.

The sound of water from the shower drifted into the room, and Pepper came out a moment later. Looking at Tony, who was still standing where she'd left him, she sighed. Going to him, she began unbuttoning his shirt. "I know you can do this by yourself," she said with a scowl. "You've practically made it an art form. How on earth were you planning on getting anything done if you couldn't even – nevermind, don't answer that."

Pepper undressed him methodically, her expression never changing from the familiar all-business look she wore. Tony stood there passively, letting her work without interference. Ignoring the predictable erection, Pepper took him by the hand and led him into the bathroom, all but pushing him into the shower.

The Tony watching the scene noted the steam pouring out of the bathroom door, and broke into a small smile. This was not an unfamiliar situation for them. Over the last ten years, Pepper had done this very thing numerous times, both when he was drunk, and when he was so injured or tired after going out in the Iron Man armor that he couldn't move. But it was the knowledge that even after only six months of working for him, Pepper had already noted something as simple as the water temperature Tony preferred, that touched him.

"What are you smiling about?" Howard asked.

Tony glance at his father, then back to where Pepper was now collecting the detritus of his suit and finding a clean pair of sweats for him to put on. "I was just reminded how much I rely on Pepper. I've never once heard her complain. I need to be more cooperative with her," he added quietly to himself.

"She goes above and beyond the call of duty, doesn't she?" Howard asked.

Nodding, Tony glanced at his father. "Daily, and I can't understand why. I don't know what I'd do without her, though. It's better that we've never had sex. If I ever did anything to hurt her, I could lose her altogether."

His father raised an eyebrow. "_Don't_ you know why she does it?"

Tony didn't answer. The younger Tony came out of the bathroom, wrapped in a towel. He seemed a little more sober now, but was still unsteady on his feet.

Howard asked quietly, "If you had her, could you be faithful to her? She'd never settle for anything less."

Tony was quiet, watching Pepper throw a pair of sweats to his younger self and ordering him to get dressed. To his great relief, the past him obeyed without question.

"I am capable of fidelity; and I would rather die than do anything to hurt Pepper," Tony answered at last. "But I'm sure you know better than anyone how badly I can mess things up sometimes. It's not worth the risk that I might do something stupid, and lose her completely."

"So, you trust her more than you trust yourself."

Pepper pulled back the covers on Tony's bed and pointed at it without a word. Docilely, Tony crawled beneath the covers, plopping down heavily, face down on the bed as though he were too heavy to support himself anymore. He wiggled around for a minute and pulled off the sweat pants he'd just gotten into, tossing them to the corner of the room. The blankets were covering him completely in seconds, and Tony adjusted his position restlessly.

The older Tony nodded, still watching Pepper. "She's always honest with me; I'm not. She's had ample opportunity to cheat me, or betray me, or hurt me in any number of ways, and I've never found any reason to suggest she would." He laughed with a bitter rush of air through his nose. "She's the only person in my life who's been consistently loyal and trustworthy. She's–" With a surprised blink, Tony froze. "She's the only one who's ever stayed; and whom I've never tried to get rid of." He looked at his father. "I don't think I understand."

"Do you need anything before I go home, Mr. Stark?" Pepper stood beside the bed, looking more exhausted than the older Tony had ever seen her.

"Blow job," Tony the younger murmured into the pillow, his hips dipping into the mattress for the friction needed to sooth his erection. He softly hummed a note of pleasure.

Pepper would have made an excellent poker player. "Good night, Mr. Stark." She turned to go, when Tony's hand shot out, gently grabbing hr wrist.

"Stay," he asked softly, almost pleading, but in a voice more steady that it had been all night. Reaching for her hip, he ran on finger along the curve of her thigh. "Don't leave me, Pep." Sleep was starting to slur his speech even more than the alcohol. "I want you."

She closed her eyes as he touched her, but captured his hand and calmly moved it away. "You don't want me, Tony." Though her face hadn't changed, her expression was softer now. Sighing, she perched on the edge of his bed. "You only think you do because I'm the only woman here."

His eyes closed, Tony nevertheless pouted at being denied physical contact. "Wanted you before, too. And there were lots of women there."

Sighing again, she began to rub his back, soothing him into sleep. "You were drunk. You're still drunk. Go to sleep, Tony."

"Pepper?"

"Hm?"

"…'m sorry. Please don't quit."

For once, Pepper's face was open, and she looked at the back of his head with so much emotion that older Tony was staggered. He'd never seen that look on her face before.

Leaning forward to turn out the light, she kissed the back of his head. Her voice was unusually thick. "I won't leave you, Tony," she promised softly. "Just try to stop making it so hard for me."

Tony was nearly asleep, reassured that Pepper would be coming back. Without a thought, he responded, "Always hard for you."

Pepper looked at him for a long moment, finally whispering into the darkness, "It's not enough." Recalling herself, she looked warily at Tony to see if he'd heard her.

She needn't have worried. Tony was out like a light. Standing up, Pepper leaned over and kissed the back of Tony's head again, her expression, at last, affectionate. "Good night, Tony. Merry Christmas."

Howard remained quiet throughout, only speaking as Pepper pulled up a chair to watch Tony sleep for a while, making certain he didn't have any complications from the alcohol or fighting. "Are you certain things are better this way?"

Tony kept watching Pepper, at a loss for words. Had he understood her right? Had she just repeated the words he'd spoken about her – that sex wasn't enough? "I would have broken her heart back then," he admitted. "I cared about her – a lot more than any other woman, even – but I was too young, too stupid, and too closed off to have given her what she wanted and deserved."

"So, for ten years you've marinated," Howard said. "You've grown older, wiser, and learned to trust her more. Why are you still wasting time on any woman but her?"

He didn't know the answer to that. Thinking it over, Tony finally replied, "It's safer. My life is dangerous, and if someone went after her because of me… I couldn't stand it. Or, I could hurt her, somehow. Maybe it's just as well; the relationship we have is good. I can get sex elsewhere, but not what Pepper and I have. I don't want to ruin that."

Howard frowned. "I never figured you for a coward, son."

With a gasp of air, Tony was back home and in bed. He looked around for his father, a retort hanging from his lips, but it was too late.

The clock on the wall read a quarter till two.


	3. Chapter 3

**An Iron Man Christmas Carol ~**

**A Love Story**

_Stave the Third_

_In which the protagonist of our story is visited by the second of three spirits, and learns what really makes the world go 'round._

The first thing Tony did once he realized he was back home again was to run into his closet and grope around on the top shelf for the baseball bat he remembered was there. He would have preferred one of the gauntlets, but that would have meant going down several flights of stairs and crossing to the other side of the house. As embarrassing as it was to admit he was shaken, he was a little too on edge to leave the safety of his bedroom.

Tony locked his bedroom door. He double-checked it. The two spirits he'd already seen hadn't needed an unlocked door to get in, but doing so made him feel better anyway. It did him the same good as the baseball bat or the gauntlet against… things that could walk through walls.

Because it had to be _things_ - didn't it?Not really the ghost of Yinsen and the ghost of his father, come back to give him advice. The idea of Yinsen advising him from beyond the grave was at least reasonable. Tony had no trouble believing that his fallen friend would provide supernatural assistance if he could – but his father? That was where credulity started to erode for Tony.

Howard Stark had never advised his son with anything – not in that way. Oh, he'd tell Tony _'Keep your nose to the grindstone,'_ and, _'Opportunity is not a lengthy visitor,'_ or _'Don't lay claim to a virtue you don't possess if you want to keep the respect of your friends.'_ But the idea of his father coming from beyond the grave to give him romantic advice? It was laughable. There were only two times in his life Tony could ever remember his father taking an interest in who he was dating.

The first time had been when Tony was still a teenager. Her name was Meredith McCall, and she had been his very first girlfriend. She had also turned out to be the daughter of one of Howard Stark and Stark Industries main competitors. Both of their fathers accused the other of trying to plant a spy in their family, and without talking to the teenagers at all, both kids were sent to schools on opposite ends of the country.

Tony had run into Meredith once, years later. She was still beautiful, but happily married, with children of her own. Tony had purposefully lost the contact information she'd given him. Not even he was selfish enough to destroy a good thing.

The second, unsurprisingly, was when a young, naïve, Tony let Sunset Bain seduce, use, and trick him into giving her the security codes to Stark Industries, allowing her to break in and steal a great many of their prototypes. When, a year after the robbery, the same woman who'd broken young Tony's heart nearly a year earlier founded Baintronics, using prototypes that were strangely familiar, Howard Stark had cared a whole lot about his son's relationship.

Now that he was thinking about it, Tony was even more skeptical. For a man with rather weak religious views, the idea of visiting spirits was disturbing. He had seen magic – knew it existed – so he was able to at least concede that there were… 'things' out there he couldn't explain or even understand… just as there were also those out there with the ability to manipulate people's minds.

The way it stood, there were three possibilities. One: Ghosts existed, were haunting him in order to… he still wasn't sure about that. Get him to tell Pepper he loved her? Also in this scenario, Tony's father was one of the guiding spirits come to help him with his love life. There were far too many parts of that scenario requiring an enormous amount of faith on his part, and thus seemed impossible.

Two: He'd somehow been drugged and was hallucinating, seeing these people and scenes from his past while his subconscious mind dwelt on Pepper, which it often did. But then who was behind it, and to what end? To get information? To make him their puppet?

Three: was tied in with number two, and was very simple – someone was fucking with him. He didn't know how – drugs, hypnotism; maybe someone had managed to hack into J.A.R.V.I.S. and these visions were nothing more than projections and suggestion. If this was the case, someone was attacking in a very unusual, but effectively rattling, sort of way.

"J.A.R.V.I.S.?" he called out to see if the A.I. was still unresponsive. The house remained silent. "Shit." Tony sat in one of the chairs in the sitting area of his bedroom, baseball bat in hand, and waited nervously. He thought about Pepper, about the Christmas party where he'd behaved like an animal toward one of only two people in the world who trusted him. He thought about the douchebag she'd been dating - he was going to have to look Roger up one day soon and… well, he didn't know what yet. He was ten years too late to beat an apology out of him for what he'd said to Pepper… or to continue beating it out of him.

He thought about the forgiveness that had come so easily to her, even though she was still furious with him. Pepper hadn't even been on the clock that night, but she'd still taken care of him, even after his behavior and even though Rhodey could easily have taken him home. She'd even stayed awhile to make sure he didn't asphyxiate in his sleep. Tony didn't know a single person who would have cared enough to do that for him after he'd treated them so abysmally. Why had Pepper?

Tony leaned back and closed his eyes, listening intently to the sounds of the house and remembered the very small signs in Pepper that had betrayed an attraction to him. They weren't all that remarkable, except that it was _iPepper/i_, and that she had never given into the lure of that attraction. Maybe he was wrong – maybe somewhere along the way, Pepper had stopped being attracted to him? The idea hurt his vanity, but it would explain a lot.

Then there was the expression of affection – maybe of more than affection - that she'd allowed herself while his back was turned and when she knew he'd never remember anything the next morning. It frightened him. Tony wanted Pepper to love him, because he loved her. But if she did love him, there were so many things that could go wrong, not the least of which, was him.

To admit to her that he was in love with her, Tony would be committing a crime against whatever better man Pepper might have found if he hadn't stepped in. He would be performing an act so selfish and so covetous that it would top every other narcissistic thing he had ever done.

It wasn't usually in his nature to care if he were being selfish or not, but there was Pepper to consider. Forget any other man – it would be a crime against Pepper. No matter what either of them felt, wouldn't it be selfish of him to have her, knowing there was someone better for her out there somewhere?

Because Tony knew that if he ever had her all to himself, he would never be able to let her go again.

He fell asleep without intending to, thoughts of Pepper circling in his mind. The baseball bat rested between his legs with one of hands wrapped around it.

Tony might have slept for minutes or hours when something caused him to awaken with a start. His hands immediately tightened around the baseball bat as he leapt to his feet, lifting it to swing if someone attacked. When no one did, Tony glanced at the clock.

Just before he'd fallen asleep, it had been approximately five minutes till two o'clock in the morning. Now, the glowing display read midnight. "What the Hell?" This was all a dream; it _had_ to be just a bad dream, and if he shut his eyes and ignored everything around him for the rest of the night, everything would go back to normal. Maybe if he took a sleeping pill…

Expectantly, Tony waited as the minutes crept up to… and then past one o'clock. He sat in the chair again, feeling with each flicker of changing numbers that he was counting down to his own execution. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes. Maybe he really _had_ dreamt of Yinsen and his father. He should go back to bed. Whatever had brought on this infestation of ghosts, imagined or not, had clearly withdrawn. Right? He would have imagined that punctuality among spirits was a mandate.

At twenty till the hour, Tony finally realized that there was light slipping into his room through the space beneath the door. He also realized that it had been there for some time. In the five full minutes he sat staring at it, Tony decided that it wasn't his imagination, and that the light seemed _alive_. It pooled uniformly just inside the door, but within that pool lights seemed to dance, like tadpoles in a pond.

At one-thirty in the morning, Tony stood up and slowly walked to the door. He opened it and stepped out into the illuminated hallway, tightly clutching the baseball bat.

The light, he discovered, came from candles; hundreds of red and gold candles in every shape and size that covered every conceivable surface. Tony didn't know what to think. Standing there outside his room, he suddenly heard the familiar strain of _'Merry Christmas Darling'_, The Carpenters' song, though played on a harp. It stuck in his mind; he knew this particular song was significant, but he could think how. Not when said music shouldn't even _be_ there, nor the army of candles.

Tony descended the stairs slowly, following the music and the clearly marked path lined with tea lights downstairs and into his living room. Here more candles held back the darkness, in such great numbers that it could have been day. A fire as large as his fireplace had ever held was blazing as well, and the room was comfortably warm.

In the very center of the room covering tables, the piano, and ever other flat surface not already claimed by a candle, were arrangements of food, chocolates, and so many other items, that it took a few minutes to process what things were amid the gorgeous display. Bottles of wine and champagne sat in crystal buckets on golden stands, condensation frosting the glass. Further from the fireplace, a pair of ice-carved swans, their neck entwined to form a heart, glistened in the light.

There were tiered stands of chocolates and truffles, so artfully arranged you were loath to take one and mar the work. In a golden bowl with protruding handles, oysters on the half shell sat ready to eat. Apples were piled and stacked into pyramids in several places, and vases of red and white roses loomed in such great number that it seemed probable that anyone else wanting roses wouldn't be able to find any in those colors for three counties.

There were beautiful bottles of perfume peeking out here and there like gems, waiting to be discovered amongst the verdure of lettuce leaves, bunches of celery, sheaves of asparagus, bananas, tomatoes, and maple leaves stuck in at strategic spots. On heart-shaped pillows, diamond and gold jewelry sparkled brightly.

Beautiful lace and silk lingerie cascaded over some of the mountains of fruit. In the middle of a pile of hand-blown glass hearts, a single teddy bear held court. An enormous golden cage, shaped like a cube, housed pairs of lovebirds and turtledoves.

And at the front of this assemblage, playing a golden harp as she sang, sat Tony's mother.

The baseball bat fell out of his hands, hitting the floor with a dull thud. Then, Tony went completely still. Before, he'd been desperate to believe that his experiences of this evening were nothing but a dream - at worse, indigestion. Yinsen had disturbed him; Howard Stark had shaken him. But his mother…

Tony couldn't look away from her. As a boy, he'd thought she was an angel. Even as he grew into a teenager and then a young man, he'd always thought that his mother was an unparalleled beauty. First generation Italian, Maria Collins Carbonell Stark was the proverbial 'great woman' behind the 'great man', Howard Anthony Stark, Jr. Though she didn't work outside the house, Maria had been known for her charity work, for the events she organized to raise money for so many of them, and the notoriety her name and social status gave, which she used freely and openly to bring in support for her various projects.

While his father was building weapons for the government, Maria was opening new homeless shelters, and starting programs designed to get people cleaned up, trained, and into either schools or jobs. But while Tony had always been in the way when his father was home, his mother gave him all the love that she could – until she had to rush back to her work and became too busy for Tony again. He didn't mind. Or he minded this less than his father's brusque disappointment. He just sat quietly off to one side, taking apart toy trains and fire engines to use for parts elsewhere while his mother sat at her little marble desk making phone calls to even more famous acquaintances and barely seemed to notice he was there.

There was no question that his mother had shown him much more affection than his father. Howard Stark pushed Tony constantly to be his best, and his disappointment when Tony didn't live up to his standards had been a motivating force for him his entire life. He had thought his father hated him, while he knew his mother loved him - she was just very busy. Staying out of his father's way, he had always ended up in the same place, or rather, with the same person. She might have been too busy for him, but at least she hadn't push him aside.

Truthfully, if he'd been in anyone's way as a boy, it had been their family butler Jarvis'. Jarvis had never treated Tony as though he were a nuisance, letting him tag along as he cleaned the house, did laundry, cooked, or any number of chores. By the time Tony was in high school, he spent most of his time in the garage inventing, when he was at home. Otherwise, if he wasn't sleeping, eating, or reading, he still went straight to Jarvis.

Tony had once asked Jarvis why the older British man loved him more than his own parents seemed to? With sad eyes, Jarvis had assured Tony that his parents loved him, but both were "the kind of people who can never sit still." Tony didn't know that this was any better – that his parents loved him, but didn't have time to slow down and be parents.

Even so, Tony had worshipped his mother. The times when she did slow down enough to remember to spend time with her son were some of the happiest memories from Tony's childhood. He was devastated at the loss of his father, but it was his mother for whom he'd cried at the double funeral after the plane crash that had left him an orphan. He was much more like his father than his mother, but whenever he met people who had known them, they would all say, without fail, that it was her whom he most favored. Something he found strange whenever he saw pictures of his parents – he could readily see his resemblance to his father, but not so easily his mother.

Tony remembered he and his father sitting on the floor in front of the Christmas tree in their pajamas, slippers, and robes, as they examined the mysterious collection of parts in one box from Howard to Tony, and another from Tony to Howard, trying to discern what they would be once assembled, and eager to finish them correctly before the other did. The memory of those Christmases with his dad, teasing, arguing, and challenging each other in a way they never did the rest of the year were the best memories he had of his father. Even so, it was his mother Tony associated with Christmas.

The entire month of December, his mother became another person. She still did her charity work, but somehow she worked harder than ever so that she could decorate the Christmas trees personally. Jarvis decorated the main house, but Maria had always found an excuse to take a break to help him. Christmas was the only time of the year that his mother cooked. With Jarvis beside her, she made gingerbread men, sheets and sheets of cookies, breads, fudge, brownies, toffee, and even candied and caramel apples.

Jarvis cooked Christmas Day, but Christmas Eve, Maria Stark would cook a traditional Christmas Eve dinner from southern Italy, where her parents had grown up. Being a day of abstinence for Catholics, and therefore not an appropriate day for meat, all the dishes contained fish. _La vigilia Napoletana_ was the traditional seven-fish dinner, consisting of roasted eel, baccala, baked fish, lobster, vermicelli with clams and anchovies, and caponata di pesce – a fish salad.

For one day, Tony was able to have the family he prayed for at night, every night. For one day, his parents weren't too busy, or distracted, and for many years, Christmas was the best day of his year, and the best holiday, too. Even after his dad had packed him up and sent him off to boarding school, Christmases at home were mandatory, and never worth missing.

The year Tony was informed that his parents' had died in a plane crash, Tony had celebrated that Christmas by getting drunk and staying in bed until New Year's. Each year thereafter was a variation on that basic theme, with Tony unable to face Christmas without his parents, but his mother most of all.

And now here she was, sitting in his living room and looking every inch the angel he'd always thought her. She was gorgeous in a sleeveless dress of red silk, with a pattern of green snowflakes winding around her and up over one shoulder to the front like an ivy vine. Maria's fingers stilled over the harp strings, the fading sound filling the large room. Tony wasn't able to find his tongue until after the reverberations echoed too softly to be heard.

"…I didn't know you knew how to play the harp," was the first thing out of his mouth. Tony would have winced, except he still couldn't move. That one sentence had taken the wind out of him.

She had been watching him watch her, waiting, with a patience she'd never possessed in life, for him to gather his wits. With a beatific smile that made the corners of her eyes crinkle, Maria laughed musically. "I didn't," she confessed, placing the harp on the floor. "I've had a lot of time in the last fifteen years. You know I hate to be bored."

Tony choked on an incredulous laugh, her voice filling him with a sweet pain that tightened his chest. Her speech pattern was familiar, too – something he'd never thought about before. He staggered forward slowly, not aware of moving until he was across the floor, standing in front of her. Tony fell to his knees, his eyes locked on his mother's face, wanting to believe, but not having believed in anything for so long, except for maybe Iron Man.

Tentatively, he lifted a hand to the woman's cheek, brushing the backs of his fingers along the prominent bone there. Maria's skin wasn't warm like that of a living person, but neither was it cold, or unpleasant. Soft and solid at the same time - reminding him of feathers, and clouds, and flower petals - her skin was nonetheless tangible, though it proved nothing.

It was her eyes that convinced him. Tony had inherited his mother's deep chocolate-brown eyes and long eyelashes – two of his many admired traits. Kneeling in front of her, Tony was eye-level with Maria, and in her eyes, he found something he'd forgotten all about: he saw mischief. He was like his father in so many ways that he hadn't much thought about where certain aspects of his personality came from. It seemed obvious now. Howard Stark had a dry sense of humor, and wasn't the kind of person you'd expect to see horsing around.

But Maria was. No, she _had_ been. Tony could clearly remember her laughter, the twinkle in her eyes as she teased his father until he couldn't help laughing too. It was the same twinkle that was in her eyes now as she waited, more patiently than she ever had, for him to complete his inspection.

"Mom?" Tony whispered in a voice barely loud enough to be heard.

"I am the living spirit of your mother, who's been gone these twelve years." Her accent was light – just enough to give her voice a musical quality… something else he'd almost forgotten.

He opened his mouth again, but no words came out. Instead a sob rose in his chest, and his eyes shone with tears that began sliding down his face. Embarrassed, Tony buried his face in his mother's lap and, _Oh, God_, her scent. Maria Stark had worn a perfume that reminded her son of honeysuckles. He sobbed again, smelling it for the first time in more than a decade, and then there was nothing he could do to prevent the tears.

"Oh, Antony," Maria pronounced her son's name in the style of his namesake, the ancient Roman General Mark Antony. "Antony, Antony… don't cry, _amore mio_. We do enough of that when we are sad. And," she continued, "today is no time for sadness." Kissing him on the back of his head, Maria Stark ran a hand affectionately through her son's hair, for just a moment, a hint of sadness in her own eyes. "Come, _figlio mio,_ and let us go out into the world and see who needs us."

From the spot atop his head where Maria had kissed him, Tony felt a warmth seep down like yolk from a broken egg. It coated him quickly to his toes, and he felt an urge to smile, which he didn't fight. Standing up and offering his hands to his mother to help her up, Tony took another look around his living room.

"Out there? Not to sound more narcissistic than usual, but isn't all this supposed to be about me?" Tony's eyes moved with curiosity over the displays of candy, fruit, lingerie, jewelry… in fact, everything he could see had a romantic or at least aphrodisiacal connotation. "What is all this?"

Maria picked out a piece of dark chocolate with an orange center and took a bite. "Mmm. This, Antony, is the Feast of _Philia_. That is, the Feast of Love and Friendship Between Friends, Family, Community, and Lovers.' Sadly, it is something you have almost completely forgotten about."

Tony was examining a satin negligee, and turned around with a slight frown. "That's not true, I have…" he thought about it. "…lovers. I have lovers."

"Antony, you have let the wounds from your past close you off from other people." She had to say it, even if it was nothing her son didn't already know. "You trust no one, you have no friends, and unless there's alcohol involved, your 'community' thinks of you as an eccentric playboy. And don't get me started on your lovers."

"Two friends. I have two really good friends," Tony contradicted triumphantly. Ah-ha! Three, if you count Happy. I have three good friends, whom I…" he had to think about it. "Yep, whom I trust implicitly. And I could give a flying fu- I could care less what my community thinks about me, whoever they are.

"As for the lovers," Tony frowned, opening one of the bottles of champagne and pouring two glasses, one of which he offered his mother. He couldn't look at her as he spoke. "They're a means to an end, that's all; a way to… blow off steam without the hassle of dating someone exclusively and having to acclimate her to my living space, and to my lifestyle. Eventually, she gets tired of the missed dates and off-limits places, and then it's all been a waste of time anyway."

Accepting the champagne glass, Maria cast a dark look at her son's before taking a sip. "Mm. I'd forgotten how much I enjoy champagne." She took another sip. "You're speaking about these women as if they're dogs, do you realize? You need to 'train' them where they can and cannot go. The lab is off limits, the bedroom, kitchen, and other common areas are not. The offices are forbidden, but the pool is acceptable. There aren't many women who would put up with you, Antony."

Maria shook her head. "But aren't you forgetting someone? Someone who is 'acclimated' to you, to whom nothing is off-limits, and who knows you well enough to forgive your forgetfulness? Why do you cast true love aside in exchange for meaningless trysts with women whose names you cannot even remember? I know you, _figlio mio_, you have always had great and passionate love in your heart. We're going to find it again."

Taking Tony's glass from his hand and putting it with hers on the table, she clucked her tongue. "I tried so hard to teach you about your father's alcoholism so that you would avoid that mistake. That man would get out of control; I always hoped it wouldn't get you, too." Reaching up to kiss his cheek, forcing him to bend a little, Maria took a portion of her dress's skirt in her fingers and offered it to Tony.

"Touch my dress, Antony. Let's find your passion."

Tony frowned, looking uncertain now that they'd reached this part of the proceedings, but after meeting his mother's eyes again and seeing the solid confidence there, he reached out and took the soft material from her.

They moved different than Tony had with his father. Then, there had been some physical experience involved – a churning upward, somehow propelling through the sky to their destination far in his past. This time, as soon as he took the material from his mother's hand, there was a flash of light all around them, not blinding, but appearing to contain every color in the spectrum without being muddy.

He recognized where they were immediately. A twenty-one mile strip of costal beaches, Malibu was thirty-six miles outside of Central Los Angeles, and one of California's rare gems. Comprised mostly of beaches, national parks, and seaside cliffs, the total number of residents according to the last census was 12,575. Nearly 200 of those residents were celebrities from all aspects of the entertainment industry, from Dinah Ross to Mel Brooks. Like Tony, the majority lived in mansions way off the beaten path along the Pacific Coast Highway, and with the exception of paparazzi, were relatively lucky to be able to go out in public without much harassment.

The Malibu Country Mart was a large outdoor boutique mall, which also included a playground and picnic area, public art gallery, and various eateries. It was a popular spot for all locals, but the increasingly upscale retail shopping made it a particular favorite for local celebrities. Even on Christmas Day, the center had a good crowd of people either shopping, or with their families at the playground and adjacent park.

Looking around at his neighbors, Tony was a little surprised to realize he only recognized a few of them. Some were employees of his, and others people he'd worked with through Pepperdine University and Hughes Research Laboratories – Stark Industries biggest local competitor.

It didn't surprise him that the majority of familiar faces were those he'd seen in movies more often than he'd spoken to. He spotted the star of his favorite Christmas movie (his one and only concession to the season); an actress he'd been seen in public with and slept with more than once, though there was never anything serious going on; and an heiress he wouldn't sleep with if you paid him.

None of them saw him of course, though it took Tony a minute to remember that. When he'd taken in the crowd before them, Tony turned to find out what he was supposed to be doing here, only to find that Maria wasn't beside him. Panicking, though he figured it was pointless to worry about spirits, Tony moved through the crowd, keeping his eyes peeled for any sign of his mother.

Maria was moving easily among the people when Tony caught up to her. From the golden rope belt looped around her waist, a large silver goblet hung. She lifted it now, and although it looked empty to Tony, she reached in and when she withdrew her hand, it was filled with tiny sparkling things that could have been glitter or diamonds. Once in a while, she would stop next to someone and with a smile she'd blow some of the dust into their faces.

The dust seemed particularly attracted to their eyes, catching the sunlight and beveling like jewels. Tony wasn't sure what was happening; Maria kept moving through the crowd and Tony looked over the people she attended to, trying to find a connection.

"Alright, I give," he called to her when she was halfway down the length of the mall. "What is it you're doing? What am I supposed to be learning here?"

His mother stopped and turned to wait for him, smiling as though she had a particularly juicy secret. "I'm spreading a very special kind of Christmas cheer," she explained, holding up the goblet for him to see.

"Okay," he looked into the goblet, still not seeing anything in it. "What kind of Christmas cheer is that? I didn't know there was more than one kind, and I definitely don't see any rum in there."

"Of course there's more that one kind," Maria gestured around them, giving him a reproachful look at the rum comment. "Not everyone needs the same things, Antony. Someone might need a reminder of all the people who's lives they've touched, or someone else may need a blessing of patience to handle their children, their in-laws, and the Christmas dinner, all on what should be the happiest day of the year."

"So what kind of cheer are you pushing?"

Maria rolled her eyes playfully. "Pay attention, _mio figlio, il mio amore._ The theme for today, is love."

Looking behind him at all the people his mother had sprinkled her dust on, and finally saw the pattern. One couple who had been arguing, had found themselves under a sprig of mistletoe, and were now in each other arms, aware of no one but each other. A crying child was still crying, but now instead of dragging her along by the hand, her harried mother had crouched down to hug her daughter, taking the very small amount of time necessary to comfort her.

An elderly man was on his cell phone, a smile on his face. Complete strangers who had been walking with their heads down, avoiding eye contact, were now chatting like old friends over a broken shopping bag as they transferred the items into a re-useable cloth bag the woman was giving the man.

Here a woman decided to turn the tables and buy roses for her husband. Over there, a young man made a complete u-turn, backtracking to the jewelry store where a display of engagement rings in the window caught his eye.

The instances were subtle, noticed in sum by Tony because he knew whom to look at, but even so, the people who hadn't been gifted with some of Maria's dust were noticing some of the individual instances of love and kindness, were reminded it was Christmas day – a time when miraculously, everyone seemed nicer, more helpful, more loving. Even these people left the market with heightened spirits.

Tony watched, fascinated, but still not sure what this was all about.

Maria seemed to know this. Looping her arm through his, she led him toward the playground where a few children climbed the slides still damp with morning dew and laughed deep, full-bellied laughs that were contagious to their parents. "Why don't you celebrate Christmas anymore, Antony?"

A little uncomfortable, Tony gave a half-shrug. "After you and dad were gone, there just didn't seem to be any point," he mumbled quietly. "It hurt too much to think about."

"So you've spent the intervening years attempting to drown your pain in scotch." There was a hint of reprove, but it didn't last long. The spirit of Christmas was too strong in her.

A few sets of parents hovered outside the concrete perimeter of the park with cups of coffee in hand, watching their children play together as though they'd known one another all their lives. Tony had been too erratic a friend for most of the kindergarten set. He loved to play tag in jungle gyms like the one in front of them, laughing and throwing himself through the colored tubes as fast as he could manage. But it was just as likely that in the very next second, he would have abandoned the game without explanation to go dig in the sand by himself, lamenting to Jarvis the lack of an adequate water supply that would enable him to construct castles.

Children had given up on Tony rather quickly, and he had been too busy studying quantum physics to mind. Staring at the tableau of happy couples keeping watch over their children, Tony frown as a realization struck him.

"You and dad never took me to places like this, did you." It wasn't a question. Tony had gone many, many places with his parents for business or charity functions, meetings, or to inspect one of Stark Industries satellite offices around the world. He'd always like those one's best. "Jarvis did, until I lost interest. I guess you guys were too busy for stuff like that, too." It was an interesting perspective of his childhood he hadn't considered before.

Maria laughed. "Can you imaging your father and I in a place like this?"

Considering it was an upscale neighborhood in Malibu, the park was well equipped and well maintained. There was nothing wrong with it that Tony could see, but he knew what she meant. He pictured his impatient father on one of the earliest cell phone prototypes, standing as far back from the dust as he could so that his pants wouldn't get dirty. If he could have managed it, Howard Stark would have even carried along a drink.

He chuckled. "I can see dad now, already in his next meeting and shouting into that monstrosity of a phone, surrounded by the scent of peppermint schnapps."

"And I in my chenille power suit taking furious notes on things I needed to get done. It's a wonder Howard and I were ever even aware we had a son."

It was hard for Tony to get a read on his mother's emotions over things like this. She spoke about them easily, even with humor, which might have seemed callow, except for the notes of empathy in her voice and the sincere compassion in her eyes. Frustrated, and just a little bit impatient, he asked, "What is it I'm supposed to be seeing here?"

The park, the children, the parents snuggled together for warmth – none of this had been a part of Tony's own childhood. It was like watching some idyllic vision of Hallmark cards brought to life, lacking only the heartfelt message on the inside. Ever the cynic about things he didn't understand, the whole panorama around where they stood looked Stepford perfect. The only thing missing was a thick blanket of snow and a horse-drawn carriage to create a Christmas moment that would have made Currier and Ives weep.

Growling in frustration, he started to turn to his mother again, when he saw her.

She was no one Tony had ever seen before. He didn't have much cause to spend time with children. But the pint-sized four-year old caught his attention because she had red hair, freckles, and the little shoes she'd placed neatly on the cement had very small heels – kitten heels, Pepper would have called them.

The girl ran to her parents, and Tony looked up, almost fearfully. Neither of them were familiar to him. The father gave his daughter a dazzling smile, swooping the laughing child into his arms. Like Tony, he had dark hair and eyes, though no goatee. His wife– predictably but still amazing – had the same color hair as her daughter, and the same freckles, too.

Tony watched them quietly for a while. "That's it, isn't it?" An odd feeling settled in the pit of his stomach as he stared through the looking glass at his apparent doppelganger family. He was an only child; heir to a vast empire and multi-billion dollar fortune. For lack of children of his own, everything Tony owned, once he'd died, would go to Pepper, with a few exceptions. He'd made certain of that.

He'd thought about producing an heir the old-fashioned way, but the logistics were far too complicated as things stood. None of the women with whom he'd been seen publicly were someone he'd want to be linked to for life, either in marriage, or joint-custody, if that; there was no telling if someone would use his lifestyle against him to gain sole-custody, and a healthy child support check.

Tony had never been entirely sure whether he wanted marriage and children or not, if the right circumstances arose. Even he didn't really think of himself as someone capable of raising a kid, and marriage seemed to him a rather archaic social construct that was more trouble than it was worth, requiring a level of trust Tony had only ever bestowed on two people. Considering the circumstances, he figured marriage and family weren't for him.

Now, watching the tiny girl in her father's arms, smiling up at him with not just love, but adoration, something throbbed in Tony's chest. The girl's smile animated her whole face, and it was like the sun coming out from behind the clouds, so pure and clean it was. Tony continued staring as he asked, "Is this what you brought me here to see?"

Eyes traveling the same path as her sons, Maria's eyes held sadness at odds with her happy smile. "No," She told him. They had both lowered their voices in a pale reflection of reverence for the uncertain, unexpected portent of Tony's future. "We are here to find, to witness, to enhance, and to create the Spirit of Christmas through the world's most vital medium: love."

He frowned in confusion, watching the family as they began walking toward the parking lot. "To be honest, this isn't the kind of love I expected you spirits to be addressing."

"Antony, _amore mio_, there is not one thing that occurs on earth that is not motivated by love, or passion, or both together," she said, pleased that he was starting to see the puzzle pieces. "Love is the energy that powers the world, but there is not just one kind of love. All these forms of love are connected, and we are all connected by it."

"Different kinds of love," Tony repeated pensively. "How many kinds are there?"

Grinning, Maria held out her hand to her son. "It depends on whom you ask," she explained. "You and I will see five. But you, my son, have more love in your life than you think, even though you try to hide from it. That is a good thing, for it means your salvation is within our grasp."

"Salvation?" Tony frowned, taking his mother's hand and moving closer. "Dad said that too. I don't understand; what do I need salvation from?"

Hand in hand, Maria led Tony back through the mall, releasing him only when she needed to spread the dust of Christmas cheer. "No man or woman can survive without love, Antony," she explained. "It is an emotional vacuum the universe abhors. In most circumstances like this, the man or woman shrivels and wastes away in the emotionless solitude they've created for their self."

A bird in a nearby tree called, and was answered almost instantly by a like sound from the next tree over. Two birds appeared, chattering happily as they swooped and dove around each other, then disappeared in the distance. "Sometimes," Maria continued, " there are people like those birds – they fly so close to one another without touching that they begin to exude their own gravitational pull together."

Tony opened his mouth to question further, but Maria continued without waiting.

"It is the job of gravity to pull things down; in order to not remain stuck within its sphere, things must be introduced to alter it." She gestured around the park and on the streets. "These people out here are your community, Antony," she said. "Perhaps some of them could even be friends. The family we saw might be yours; but unless you allows _philia_, into your life, you will have no community with whom to form friendships and loyalties."

"I have friends," Tony responded with a frown. "There were nearly 500 people at my last birthday party alone – and that's not including the entertainers."

Maria looked closely, penetratingly at her son. "Are they really friends, son? _Philia_ is about equality among peers," she explained. "_Philia_ is the love on which friendship is cultivated. It is the virtuous love between friends, and the enjoyment in performing an activity together.

"It is not," she added. "What you have with the women you 'entertain', or with the sycophantic society mob who calls you 'friend'. Can you name the last five women who've shared your bed? Or the two men who came as guests, but drew you schematics for a phone that projects holographic images of the caller, on the back of a cocktail napkin, impressing not just you, but Ms. Potts so much that you to hire them on the spot without further interviews?"

Tony didn't have to think about it, he just shook his head, knowing he didn't have those answers. Unless she was a business contact, or someone he was genuinely interested in knowing better (or at least sleeping with more than once), Tony made no effort to remember a woman's name after getting out of bed with her. Similarly, most men held no interest for him either, unless they related to his business, or Iron Man. To be fair, there were women in that category, too, but what it really meant was that every instance was situational, usually with the same result. And the new guys... were still the new guys. Pepper had their info, and he'd learn it by the time he needed to.

"Our world need heroes," Maria said, taking her son's hand. "But not all heroes need capes, or masks, or shiny red and gold metal suits. Sometimes, what the world needs… what _your_ world needs, is just Antony."

Everything around them begin to waver the minute Maria took Tony's hand in her own. As the lights grew brighter, then sank low and dim again, her last couple of sentences became a tangible, viscous arrangement of letters swirling around them. By the times her voice grew quiet, the floating letters faded, and the lights returned to normal, Tony was catching his breath in the living room of a modest apartment, Maria at his side.

It took him a moment to recognize where they were; he'd only been there a handful of times since Rhodey had been transferred to the Los Angeles Air Force Base. Tony and his previous military liaisons had not always seen eye to eye. More accurately, Tony liked to fuck with said liaisons, because he thought it was funny. When it was somehow discovered that Mr. Stark's best friend was not only in the service, but a Lieutenant Colonel with the USAF, it seemed like a match made in heaven.

And it was – as much as it could be. Rhodey could handle Tony, and Tony treated Rhodey with a little more respect than he had the other liaisons. Other than Tony's insistence on working on his own timetable, not the military's, both men seemed pleased with the arrangement.

It was impossible to tell how long Rhodey had been living in the one bedroom apartment just by looking at it. The place had come painted, furnished, and decorated – something Tony had teased him about each time he visited. The living room had nineteen-foot vaulted-ceilings, and a working gas fireplace. The walls were colored moss green with white wainscoting along the top and bottom, but every other wooden surface – from doors and built-in bookcases, to the mantle, tables and chairs – was made from smooth, polished, walnut.

The furniture was in a medium-colored fawn microsuede, forming a horseshoe before the fireplace and television, end tables interspersed throughout. It was here that a group of eight men and women had gathered, beer or glasses of wine in hand.

"It's Rhodey's place," Tony muttered needlessly, just as he didn't need to look to his mother for confirmation.

"Your best friend?" she nodded in the affirmative, despite the question.

Tony nodded back. "We were roommates at M.I.T.," he reminded her. "He acted as kind of a big brother to me. I was young, brilliant, famous, and fabulously wealthy," he gave a short laugh. "There were tons of the young and brilliant set at M.I.T., but throw in the rich and famous part… there was only one other kid at school who was all four, but he mostly ignored everything. Rhodey introduced me to who he called, 'the important people,' took me along with him wherever he went – if it weren't for Rhodey, I don't think I would have left the room at all."

Maria studied the group seated before them. Excluding Rhodey, there were five men in the group. Three of them had brought wives, with the host himself bringing their party to nine people. "These then, were your social group? Whatever happened to them?"

Tony frowned, not liking to remember. "We kept in touch after everyone graduated; for a few years, at least. Then…" the image of a blackened hunk of twisted metal, lying in a Jamaican sugar cane field. It was still smoking nearly twenty-four hours after the crash and large hoses had been sent for. No one hurried.

Noting the way his face became paralyzed with pain at the memory, Maria waited for him.

"I was with them… when I got the call about the plane crash," Tony explained after several breathless moments. "Dad had said something about 'wasting time'; you said something like 'there still just kids'… I remember kissing you goodbye, and telling dad that, 'I hoped he was _real_ productive on his Jamaican holiday, then went to bed. I left for Brandon's the next morning and by that evening…" he stopped, eyes searching out the one called Brandon.

He was there with his wife, whom Tony only had a vague memory of meeting on that one, fateful trip. Brandon's laugh was familiar though, like something from a long forgotten dream, and Tony absently looked around for Rhodey as he added to his mother, "I haven't been able to think about these guys without thinking about my parents death," he murmured, straightening as he spotted his best friend. "Besides, they do just fine without me. See?"

Maria hummed noncommittally, as Rhodey climbed over the end of a loveseat to an empty space and put the tray of miniature hot links he'd been carrying down on the coffee table. "Careful," he warned in a serious voice. "When they say hot, they ain't joking."

"See Jennifer, I bet you Tony Stark wouldn't touch such pedestrian food as this if you paid him," a blond man said to a brunette diagonal from him.

An Indian man shook his head, looking up. "That isn't fair, Randall; I'm sure Tony wouldn't be so picky… if there were a beautiful woman to feed it to him."

The group laughed. Tony watched silently, his face impassive.

"Hey!" Rhodey, cut in with a grin, once their laughter had died down. "Chris, man, not cool. You're all entitled to your opinions about Tony, but honestly; you don't even know the guy anymore. Tony's my best friend, and although he can be… difficult," there was a titter from the group. "Sometimes," Rhodey tagged on firmly. "He's got a good heart, and I know he's got my back."

Tony's head drooped a little, looking down at his feet.

"Are you alright?" His mother asked.

"I was just thinking," he muttered. "It's once a year, and it's not like he ever asks me to do anything else like this for him. I should have told him I'd go. At least for a while."

Maria looked like the Mona Lisa when she smiled. "Not everyone still has family after their family dies. Rhodey may not be of your blood, but the love you and he bear for one another is a natural affection felt between family members. It is this _storge_ which makes you brothers; this rare affection that allows you to accept one another's faults more easily, because you are a clan of your own making.

"So why hasn't he come in so many years, Rhodey?" Another man with brown hair, and a long nose, asked.

Rhodey shook his head. "I don't know, Marcus. He hasn't told me yet. I suspect it has something to do with the same reason he stopped celebration Christmas, but he's keeping quiet on that, too. Till he decides to tell me…" he shrugged.

"Is it a girl?" One of the wives leaned forward.

"Hey, right!" Her husband, a stocky redhead looked up from the sausage he was eating. "Didn't he get all emotional and broody over that one girl who dumped him? What was her name… Sunday?"

Randall shook his head. "No, it was Sunset. And man, if she'd done to me what she did to Tony, I'd have been emotional and broody, too." To his wife, Jennifer, he said, "Gorgeous woman, right? Older than him, but this is Tony Stark. Somehow, she gets him to tell her the security codes to his dad's company, then drops him cold. A week later, there's a break in, and a year later, she's opening a company with some of the stolen prototypes from his pop's company."

Jennifer's mouth hung open in what could only be called horror. "Oh, how terrible! Well, its no _wonder_ he's a man-whore!"

The room exploded with laughter and Jennifer turned dark purple with embarrassment.

"I didn't mean it quite like… I just meant that he… goes out with a lot of women," she stammered lamely."

Rhodey shook his head. "No, he doesn't," he corrected, still laughing. "He _sleeps_ with a lot of women. The only 'out' he goes with them is 'out' of the club, to the limo; then 'out' of the limo, to the house."

Still red, but feeling a little vindicated, at least, Jennifer said, "But still… it makes sense, doesn't it? If someone had done something like that to me, I would have a hell of a hard time trusting anyone every again."

Chris nodded gesturing to Jennifer. "She's got a point, Rhod. In fact, I'm surprised he's kept you around so long. You must be the only person in the world he trusts. You've practically been inseparable since M.I.T., and Stark was just a baby then!"

"You calling us old, Hale?" Rhodey threw a balled up napkin Chris's direction, with a grin.

"Wait a minute," Brandon's wife, Claudia, shifted her glass from one hand to the other. "I remember reading about a girl Stark has had for years and is really protective of. I remember, it was in one of those trashy tabloids you should never believe, but then the very next week, the paper printed a retraction letter. I thought, 'now, why print a retraction letter in a trashy tabloid unless something hit a little too close to the truth?' Her name was unusual… Pepe, or something… Poppy."

All heads turned as one to Rhodey who was obviously not a good poker player. When it became clear that there actual was something to tell, his guests urged him on, pleading for _something_.

Rhodey sighed, folding his arms. "Pepper," he said. "Her name is Pepper. She's his personal assistant."

"Pepper!" Claudia repeated excitedly. "That's what it was. She's his assistant, so, they're lovers as well? How does she deal with his womanizing? Or is that just a front to protect her?"

"Hey, hey, hey, no, no, no." Rhodey put his hands up, palms out, to slow her down. "Alright, look. Any of this ends up on the news, or in the papers, I'm gonna figure out which one of you did it, track your ass down, and haul it to Gitmo on terrorism charges. We clear?" Everyone nodded. "These are people I love and respect, and if they get hurt, I get hurt. Which means _y'all_ get hurt. Got it?" They nodded again.

Rubbing the back of his head, Rhodey searched for what to say that wouldn't be betraying his friendship with Tony and Pepper. "Okay, so Pepper's been Tony's P.A. for about ten years now. They are not, nor have they ever been lovers, but they are best friends. Which is good, because they work an ungodly amount of hours together."

Marcus raised an eyebrow. "He's in the paper with three or four different women every week, and that's just on average. So why hasn't he bagged this one yet? Is she a dog, or something?"

"Oh, _hell_ no," Rhodey laughed. Disappearing into the next room for a minute, he returned holding an eight-and-a-half by eleven-inch picture frame. "This is Tony, Pepper, my date Suzanne, and I at the Stark Industries Halloween party just this past October." He handed it to Marcus, and everyone moved closer to see.

Tony looked over the heads of the assemblage to see which photo of them it was, and smiled to himself. The picture had been taken near the beginning of the evening, when they were all still neatly put together, and sober. Pepper had clearly arranged their costumes, which were matching, and of excellent quality. Starting on the left, Suzanne and Rhodey smiled into the camera, dressed as Betty and Barney Rubble, his arm around her waist.

In the middle, dressed as Wilma Flintstone, Pepper's mouth and eyes were open wide with outrageous laughter at something Tony, on her right, had just said. Dressed as a tousle-haired Fred Flintstone, Tony met her gaze and smirked back at Pepper. Her side against his front, his arms were around her waist, resting on her far hip, casually. For a candid shot, it couldn't have been a better picture if it had been posed and staged.

"They're not dating?" Claudia clarified, to which Rhodey shook his head. Turning the picture around she pointed to Tony's face. "We are looking at the same picture, right? Tell me I'm not the only one who sees this." She looked to the others for support.

Desiring to support his wife, Brandon took the picture from her again and frowned at it. "… they seem very… close," he said after a moment.

"Proprietary," Jennifer, a psychologist, interjected. "Both the way he's holding her and the way he's looking at her, are a message to all other men there that she belongs to him and is therefore, not to be touched. Rhodey, do you know if anyone spoke to or flirted with her that evening?"

Rhodey thought hard. "I wasn't with her the entire time – she was working for a lot of it, but to be honest, I don't really remember Pepper getting hit on at any of the parties we've been at together. If Tony takes a woman home with him, she calls a cab, or gets a ride elsewhere, if the car is gone or doesn't come back. If Tony doesn't take someone home, she goes back to the mansion with him, gets everything settled for the night, and then, if she doesn't have any work to do, she goes home herself."

Everyone stared at Rhodey with a mixture of unreadable expressions. Jennifer cleared her throat. "Friends, you say," she said quietly. "Very, very, good friends, I say. If not more."

They looked to Rhodey again, even Tony, who wasn't sure what his friend would tell them.

Rubbing the back of his neck again, Rhodey shrugged. "I'm afraid that's not my information to comment on, one way or the other," he said. "At this point, nothing they did would surprise me, and if they did decide to become a couple, in any way – I would say that Tony's the luckiest son-of-a-bitch I've ever known, and that Pepper is an angel and a saint, who couldn't have found a man more devoted to her."

Tony jumped, feeling a hand on his arm, but turned to see his mother looking up from the picture.

"It's time to go," she said. "We've still much to see."

Stepping away from the party, this time Tony held out his hand to her.

"They're right, you know," Maria told him. "She's beautiful."

Tony looked at her quietly for a long time. "I was so used to... something else; something less authentic. Pepper's the real deal… and I almost missed it."

"You still might." Giving him a sympathetic smile, Maria took Tony's hand, and the world changed again. A burst of cold air swirled around and through them. Rising, they twirled to a stop in the quiet of Tony's lab.

Realizing he was back in his workshop, Tony frowned in confusion. He looked at everything, searching for an explanation as to why they were here. "Alright, I give. Is this the end of the tour?"

"Not quite," Maria laughed. "There's a kind of love where the object of your desire is all that you can think about. Your world circles them just as much as your mind does. You are always striving to spend time with them, and you feel you could never be happy without them." Grinning, she untwisted one of the straps of his muscle shirt.

"What in your life do you feel this way about, _figlio mio?_"

At first he thought it was a trick question, except not all of those criteria fit what he at first assumed… then he got it. Or thought he did. It was an odd answer for a lesson on love.

"Go ahead, say what's in your head right now."

"…Iron Man," he finally breathed out, bracing himself for censure. "Iron Man – I think about it all the time; everything I do is either for the Iron Man, or is going on in my head while my hands are with something else. When I have to leave the lab for meetings, sleep, anything, all I want is to get back in the garage. I know, now that I've had this experience in my life, that if I ever had to let this go, I would never be completely happy again; I'd always miss it too much." He thought about it again for a second, then nodded. "Yep. Iron Man."

"Exactly," Maria clasped her hands in front of her. "Show me?"

Tony didn't understand the request; not right away. Staring at her, when Maria's eyes flicked over to where the suit was suspended, his own eyes opened wide in understanding, then delight. "Oh!" Looking at the suit, a slow smile began to form. "Right! Yes, of course!"

He hurried over, waking up computers with a wave of his hands and grabbed the pieces of the under suit to put on. Tony felt giddy. Like a ten-year old boy eagerly showing his mother a model rocket he'd built, or a birdcage made from popsicle sticks. "Dummy! You! It's launch time, boys. Time to get old Shellhead out for some exercise."

The robots addressed began preparing the suit-up gantry in its special room off to the side; a routine they'd performed many times over by now. Looking up, he waved Maria over. "Boys, this is mom. Mom, these are the boys." He nodded to Dummy, then You. "I built these two chuckleheads in college, and the rest later. It's good you got to see them now, because Dummy might have to be repurposed as a hat rack if he doesn't stop trying to cuddle with me whenever I say, 'closer'."

With a laugh, Maria came to see the robots at work. "Where did he learn that, I wonder?"

Tony snorted. "Certainly not from me. Pep thinks he's been watching '40s movies when we aren't in here and picked it up then. Things like that happen with him once in a while. He's very impressionable."

The under suit was on and the robots all appeared to be in place and ready. Tony walked onto the grid-marked platform and grinned excitedly at his mother. "You ready?"

When Maria nodded, Tony gave the command for the robots to do their thing. Instantly, the floor beneath his feet split. Some levels rising, some folding outward to reveal further robotic components, and one, just before him, holding the large red shoes of the Iron Man suit. Tony stepped into them. Arms in front and back brought up the well-padded shells of the leg armor, fitting the halves together, then ratcheting and screwing them into place.

From the ceiling, circular barrel arms came down, meeting Tony's up-stretched arms fitting the first half of the gauntlet on from fingers to elbow, then extenders descended, pulling the rest of the arm-piece up to his shoulder. Shoulder blades, side plates; from above came the chest plate, back plate, and housing for the RT. Everything tightened into place and the barrel arms released him to drop a little. Last of all, the two halves of the head brace came forward, making up the jaw and supporting his head beneath the mask, which was now closing over his face.

Making her way over to him, Maria examined the suit closely. "And, this is what powers it?" she put her hand over the glowing RT in his chest.

He nodded once, solemnly. _"Necessity is the mother of all invention",_ he said in Iron Man's mechanical voice. _"We already had the technology, just not in an easily usable format. Then… Afghanistan."_ Walking over to his workbench, he looked down at some of his blueprints sitting there from when he'd been working on he suit this afternoon. _"You should have seen how quickly I invented this,"_ he tapped the disc in his chest. _"When I needed it to save my life. The applications I've been able to put it to since then are endless – only, I'm unwilling to let anyone else get their hands on this technology. It's too dangerous."_

Taking off the helmet, Tony turned it around to looking into its face with a fond smile. "The Iron Man is my crowning achievement," he said. "The most important thing I've ever created. It's the first thing I've ever invented that I'm honestly, sincerely, proud of."

"Eros is the type of love most commonly associated with romance," Maria said. "And while it usually is, it doesn't have to be sexual in nature. It's that head-over-heels feeling. It is passion and longing; a unending desire to be together. It is an appreciation of physical beauty, and a contributor to an understanding of spiritual truth." With a smile, Maria reached for his hand. "Eros usually changes from one form of love to another within eighteen to twenty-four months, and if it is meant to last, it will survive this transition. You have a great deal of passion in you, _figlio mio_. It's the one type of love you have no trouble with… except for one thing."

Helmet tucked under one arm, Tony frowned at his mother as he reached his hand out for hers. "What one thing is that?"

Taking her hand in his his gauntlet-covered one, the world moved again, Tony's lab melting like a watercolor painting beneath an open tap. Things bulged one way, then the other, and finally Tony and Maria settled down in the middle of an entrance court within a loft-style condo, all done up for Christmas.

"You don't let things develop, even when they should." She answered his question "For example, have you ever been here?"

Tony stepped away from his mother, looking around at the unfamiliar furnishings, sleek, but with an old-world elegance. Twenty feet overhead, a wrought iron railing, stained a light pink, wrapped around the outer edge of the upper story. Beneath that, at the center of the house was an open French-country kitchen, and far beyond that out the back French doors was a swimming pool-cum-lagoon. The floor was completely tiled with stone on the ground floor, yet still looked homey and comfortable, and classic.

"No," Tony said after studying what of the condo he could see. "Should I have? Who's is it?"

Maria grinned, going to examine some of the Renaissance era art on the wall. "Who's could it be?"

Brow furrowed, Tony looked around again. The art on the walls stood out to him. He'd seen it before, though that wasn't much of a surprise. He often flipped through art catalogues and chose things that appealed to him, leaving Pepper to assess the value and curate. He wasn't ignorant, by any means, but unless a work of art was particularly outstanding to him, Tony wasn't inclined to remember it. He walked around the left side of the main floor, where he hadn't been able to look earlier. There was a guest room on this side, along with a full bathroom, a sauna, and a steam room.

Opening the door to the bathroom, he looked inside, and was met with a wall of aromas, all of them feminine, and all of them familiar. Going inside, he looked at the bottles and jars and sprays set out on the beaten metal shelf, just about the level of his hip. Picking them up at random, he unscrewed the caps and inhaled the scents, smiling to himself almost instantly. He knew where they were. The citrus, honeysuckle, and vanilla combination belonged to no other woman than Pepper Potts.

Returning to where his mother was examining a painting by female Renaissance artist, Sophonisba Anguissola, Tony announced, "This is Pepper's home."

Without looking away, Maria nodded with a smile. "Yes. She has excellent taste in Italian art. All of her choices here are exquisite."

"They're mine, actually," Tony mumbled offhandedly. "Not that she didn't pick them. We were sent one of Anguissola's paintings as part of a bigger order, by mistake. Pepper knew what it was the minute she saw it and was practically in raptures, so I didn't send it back." The painting on the opposing wall was a lesser-known da Vinci, a piece he'd gotten her as a thank-you gift not long after becoming Iron Man.

"I got her to tell me which paintings were her favorite, ordered what I could, then once they arrived I told her to curate them, but hang them at her place." Tony looked around, a smile on his face hovering between smug and pleased. "I guess she did. Where is Pepper, actually? I assume we're here to see her?"

"To some extent, yes," Maria led him around to the right where a flight of stone stairs led to the second floor. Looking over his shoulder with a playful grin, she added, "This _is_ all about teaching you to embrace your feelings of love."

Tony made a face. "Mom," he protested, feeling his cheeks warm as they hadn't in years. At the top of the stairs they turned, and the first door on the right led into the master suite. It was a large room with a sitting area containing a television, coffee table, love seat and chairs. The floor was still stone, but rugs offered some protection against the cold. A section of the floor rose in a platform, and a king-size, four-poster bed held center stage. The bed was heavy walnut, intricately carved by hand with intricate rosebuds. The bedding was a rich wine color, and a long strip of pale gauze wound around the crossbars on each side.

Pepper wasn't in bed, though it was still warm from her body. He was debating peeking into the bathroom, when the door opened and Pepper came out with her hair in a ponytail, wearing only a matching black lace bra and panty set, and a white satin bathrobe.

Maria made no effort to look away, openly scrutinizing the woman who had captured her son's heart, even if he was, as yet, reluctant to act on it. Tony, with a surprised yelp, somersaulted heavily backwards over the bed in his suit and actually did try to look away, closing his eyes and knocking his head against part of the wall like a flagellant monk in penance.

Noting his effort with interest, Maria narrated for him. "She's getting dressed… lovely red hair, Antony. My mother would have said that fairies had been dancing on her skin to leave so many freckles." Something like a broken moan came from Tony. Maria continued. "She's not skeletal, or so gaunt she's ethereally gorgeous, and she's certainly had no work done… she's real. She isn't trying be anything or anyone she isn't."

Tony had stopped banging his head, letting it hand as he just listened to his mother talk. "No," he agreed. "Not even to me. Pepper doesn't compromise herself for any reason. That's one of the things that makes her invaluable. I always know where I stand with her, and she won't say 'yes' just to please me."

"She's dressed now."

He looked up to see Pepper pulling a brush through her curls, back in the bathroom. It looked like one of those days where she wouldn't be taking the trouble to iron her hair. He rarely got to see her in color. At work, she stuck with more professional greys, whites, taupes, and other neutrals. Today she was wearing red; a red sheath of a dress, with a stylish bateau neckline and three-quarter length sleeves.

Tony liked her in red. He wanted to suggest she wear some gold jewelry to match the belt, but remembered that he wasn't really there. It occurred to Tony that he had no idea where she was going today; what her plans were. She'd invited him to spend Christmas with her, and he… he'd been rude, actually. Downright mean. Embarrassed, he rubbed the back of his neck with one hand.

The doorbell chimed downstairs, and Pepper's pretty face creased in confusion. Putting her brush and hairdryer back where they belonged, she slipped into the walk-in closet, emerging a minute later with a pair of red, five-inch, peep-toed stilettos. Carrying them down the stone stairs and across the floor, she looked through the spyhole first. Pepper still looked a little confused after she'd identified her visitor, but she wasn't worried enough not to open the door.

The man who stood on the other side wore formal clothing, with the exception of a jacket, which he'd replaced with a well cared for leather one. He was older than Pepper by at least ten years, but he wore it well. He'd been wearing his hair cut close recently, but in his younger days, had been know for his incomparable locks. Tony recognized him right away; remembered partying with the guy before he'd cleaned up and gotten out of the scene eons ago. He even remembered, now that he thought about it, that Jesse Howell still lived in Malibu. What he _wanted_ to know, was why said actor was currently on his P.A.'s doorstep.

"Jesse," Pepper said pleasantly, stepping out to give him a hug. "Merry Christmas. I'm surprised to see you; are you going to the Kitchen today?"

Jesse flashed her the grin Tony knew he used on women he was trying to get into bed with.

"Yeah, I was just on my way over there now, and walked past your place on the beach," he said, carelessly. "I wasn't sure if you'd be coming or not, so I thought I'd knock and offer you a beachfront escort. If you're ready," he added, eyebrows raised over sparkling blue eyes.

"Um…" Pepper looked back behind her uncertainly, giving Tony a rush of pleasure that quickly died as she continued. "I just finished getting ready, and if we start walking now, we'll get there just about on time, so… let me get my purse and jacket and lock up." She went around to the closet to get her things, and though she hadn't specifically invited Jesse in, she had left the door open, which he took as an invitation.

Peeking around each corner to see down the long sides of the first floor, Jesse left the artwork for last. He didn't seem impressed with the Sophonisba Anguissola's, '_The Chess Game'_, Which Tony surprised himself by knowing was Pepper's favorite.

"Isn't it beautiful?" Pepper had returned and was now studying the painting with loving eyes. "It's not mine really, it's my bosses, but he was kind enough to let me pretend to own something so stunning."

Jesse started to answer, then didn't, looking from her to the painting again. "What is it about this painting you like so much?"

"Oh," Pepper stepped closer and reached up as if to touch the canvas, but simply let her fingers caress the air above it. "A lot of things. I love how it's an excellent example of photorealism, yet the figures are so rich and almost dream-like. I love the old nanny here in the upper corner; how she contrasts with the three cherubic faces of the artist's sisters. I love the colors, and how she used so much paint.

"I love that humanism beginning in that era was starting to allow female artists to become internationally known, yet they were still constrained as to what they were allowed to paint, so they had to get creative. Self-portraits, portraits of family members, portraits on commission, scenes from the bible." She shrugged. "I guess I like all the history; how it got from Sophonisba Anguissola's villa in Renaissance Italy to my villa in modern day Malibu.

It was hard to tell just how much Jesse was taking in of what she was saying. "Including the part of its history where your boss gave it to you?" He asked. Looking around both corners, he counted twelve other paintings that looked to be in the same style as the first one. "Are all of these by the same artist?" He asked. "Did he pick them out for you or did you choose them yourself?"

She took him around quickly, pointing out the features. She had six Anguissolas – portraits, biblical scenes, and one sketch of a crying toddler with a crawfish attached to his finger - a couple of stormy shipwreck scenes, a few gorgeous Bellinis, and of course, her beloved da Vinci, _'La Scapigliata'._

"'_Portrait of the Artist's Sister In The Garb Of A Nun'_ was the first one we received, accidentally. Tony ordered the rest afterward and let me keep them here. All of the other pieces are ones that I either showed interest in, and he noticed, or I asked if I might hang them in my home. This one though," Pepper smiled softly, taping the frame of the da Vinci gently, "is all mine. Things were so insane after Tony became Iron Man – not just work, but fielding press, publicity, the board – I thought I was going to either die from exhaustion or strangle Tony first, _then_ die from exhaustion.

"One day I came to work and this was on an easel in my office. The note just said, _'I'd be lost without you.'_

Jesse rolled his eyes, heading for the front door. "So, lines like that still actually work?"

Picking up her shoes, Pepper followed him, setting her alarm – very similar to the one protecting the Stark Manor – and locking the door. She frowned deeply at Jesse. "You don't understand." She paused, thinking. "Alright. If we were talking about any other woman, it probably would have been a line."

"But it's not with you?" He stopped to wait for her at the edge of the beach. "If he's like that with everyone else, why wouldn't he be like that with you?"

"He just wouldn't," Pepper insisted mildly, not really knowing how else to explain. "Mr. Stark is a lot of things, and I've seen sides of him most people never will, and he can definitely be… I don't know, phony, if he wants to. But he's never like that with me. In ten years, he never has been."

"That you know," Jesse muttered under his breath. He had taken off his own shoes and socks, too and they were walking on the firm wet sand above the tide line. Tony and Maria follow, curious to hear their conversation.

"No," Pepper said firmly. "He never has."

It was quiet for a few minutes. "So… I take it you two are pretty close?"

Pepper was never quite sure how to answer this question. She found that she usually gave the wrong one. "We've worked together under extreme circumstances for more than a decade. We've worked eighteen-hour days more often than not. We've saved each other from life-or-death situations… Yes, I'd say we're close. Not in a physical way, but emotionally? Sure. It's helped me understand him."

Jesse nonchalantly grabbed Pepper's hand, holding it loosely between them as they walked. "You and he have never…?"

"No," Pepper laughed, looking at their hands uncertainly, but for the moment, not removing hers. "We haven't. He's my employer and… we've been 'just friends' too long, I guess. And I'm not a cheeseburger."

"You're not a what?" Jesse looked at her, laughing hard.

She blushed, but smiled. "I'm not a cheeseburger. I'm not something you can have on a whim and then forget about when you're done, never to think about it again until you get another urge to have one."

"I see," Jesse nodded with mock solemnity. They stopped at the back door of a local church, which was operating this afternoon as a soup kitchen. The scent of Christmas dinner wafted out from inside. "So if you're not a cheeseburger, Ms. Potts, what would you like to be?"

Letting go of his hand, Pepper finger combed her curls. "Water. Or if not water, something vital to life; something people think they need that makes life better, like coffee. But I guess I'd have no right to ask something like that. For me, my job would always come first. What most people don't understand is that Tony is my job."

Jesse was staring at her curiously. "When was the last time you had a serious boyfriend?"

Tony frowned darkly.

Pepper's smile had faded and she started to head inside. "Eight and a half years. Coming in?"

Shaking his head, Jesse followed her.

"Asshole," Tony muttered under his breath. "Who does he think he is?"

"Pepper handled him just fine," Maria soothed.

"She shouldn't have had to be questioned like that in the first place. He better not be working with the paparazzi, or-"

Maria laughed softly, putting a hand on her son's shoulder. "Calm down, Antony, calm down. Let's go in and watch."

Tony grumbled, but obediently did as she said.

For the next few hours that flittered by in handfuls of minutes, Tony and his mother watched Pepper, Jesse, and several other volunteers serve Christmas dinner to hundreds to homeless or low-income residents. Other programs were there, passing out one gift each per child, and offering free medical and dental treatment for the day.

Pepper seemed to be well known there. Tony knew she didn't attend church any more than he did, so she must find time to do other volunteer work than just this for some of the diners to know her name and greet her so warmly. To his displeasure, Jesse hovered around Pepper too, asking questions, inviting her on breaks, or simply stationing himself near her, especially whenever he was recognized and had to take a break to sign autographs.

When it was time for them to go, both said their goodbyes to diners and volunteers alike and returned to the beach, taking their shoes off once more. Jesse handed Pepper a CD jewel case, which she looked at curiously.

"What's this?"

"Me," Jesse grinned easily, taking her other hand and starting back down the beach. "Well, old me. This is that band I was in on that show back in the 80s-"

"Oh, right!" Pepper chuckled. "What were you guys called? 'Johnny and the Reavers'?"

He smiled. "That was us. I sang and played lead guitar on most of those, but there are a few where I got to be on the drums, which is my thing." Jesse played air drums.

"Then I look forward to listening. Thanks, Jesse."

The rest of their walk was mostly quiet, a few comments here and there made about the water, or beach, or sky. They returned to Pepper's villa in no time and after letting herself in, she turned around to thank Jesse for the escort.

She clearly hadn't been expecting the kiss. Her eyes opened wide in surprise and she put a hand on his shoulder. Whether she intended to pull him closer or push him away wasn't clear, even to her. In a minute it was over, and Jesse was looking down into her eyes to gauge her response. Pepper still looked a bit stunned, which wasn't necessarily a bad thing. She hadn't been kissed in a long, long, time.

"Go out with me – Taverna, on Civic Center. I like to go there on Fridays and play the congos, do some dancing…. What do you say?"

Pepper frowned, trying to force her brain to work again. "Friday? Um… I don't know…" She looked inside guiltily.

Jesse grabbed her hand, and her attention. "Pepper. It's a crime for a woman like you not to have a social life, just because your boss is demanding and needy. He can have you the other six days of this week; I just want part of the one."

"…Okay," Pepper nodded, staring at him. "I accept. But you should know, it's very possible I'll need to reschedule, and that's _if_ Mr. Stark doesn't figure out I'm going on a date.

Raising an eyebrow, Jesse asked, "Why would he care about that? I though you guys weren't –"

"Oh, we're not," she said, adding, "exactly," under her breath. "But Tony is… let's just say Tony doesn't like sharing his toys." She held up a hand. "And don't bother pointing out what's wrong with that sentence, I know. There's just no better way to say it."

Shaking his head, Jesse laughed and gave her a salute. "Hopefully I'll see you Friday then. If I don't hear from you, I'll pick you up here about 6:30?"

"Sure, sounds good. Thanks, Jesse."

She waited until he disappeared from view before shutting and securing the door again.

Tony was pacing back and forth while his mother watched in silence. He looked as though he would explode.

"What comes of this?" he finally asked in a loud burst.

Maria shook her head sympathetically. "My view of the future is limited. But I see both happiness and tragedy for her, and nothing but tragedy for you, if these shadows remain unaltered."

Looking down at the Iron Man suit, Tony ran a hand over the RT unit on his chest. "You said it yourself, mom; 'Eros doesn't last beyond eighteen to twenty-four months'. It changes."

"Is that what you think you have for Pepper?"

Tony frown. "What then?"

"You feel a great many kinds of love for Pepper, but what makes your feelings for Pepper unique, is that you feel _Agape_ for her," Maria explained. "This is a love that is thoughtful, unconditional, and self-sacrificing. It is the love that consumes; the highest, purest form of love there is."

He nodded slowly. "That's a good thing, right?"

"Yes, _figlio mio_, it is a good thing. It is the reason we are all here to see you tonight. It is not a love that everyone is privileged to feel."

Tony turned away, thinking about her words, and nearly jumped when she put her hand on his shoulder.

"Come, Antony. Time grows short, and there is still much to see."

The reminder that he would once again be losing his mother sobered Tony. "After this, I don't know if I can stand any more," he tried to joke weakly. Maria's hand was reaching out again for his, and he took it, grasping it tightly, as if he could hold her here by a combination of his own will and strength.

They traveled, but they did not travel as before. Then they had been visiting specific places significant to Tony and his life. Now, it was as if someone were continuously plugging wrong addresses into their GPS and they were bouncing between locations, never stopping for more than a few minutes at each place.

Tony didn't know how many places they had been before he began to realize the common thread between each of their stops.

In Japan, a couple quietly eats dinner together. In Italy, a pair of young men walk hand in hand along the beach. In India, a young man finally spends his first moments alone with the woman he's married, and discovers they both play the tanpura. The hands of two young ladies meet over apricots at a farmer's market in Queens. A soldier in Afghanistan writes a letter to his wife and the son he's never seen, back home. London teenagers go to the cinema, and in Paris, a young man proposes to a young lady.

They also saw mothers singing lullabies to their children, adults caring for their elderly parents, neighbors bringing soup to sick neighbors, or casseroles to those in mourning. A little girl on a playground gets into a fight protecting her younger brother from bullies. A college student buys a street person breakfast on his way to class, and another empties the change from the bottom of her purse into the guitar case of a street busker.

In Sweden, a young woman holds the door for an older woman, smiling hello. In Spain, a son calls his mother from school, just because he misses her. A blind old man laughs deep from his belly as a puppy licks his scratchy face. A toddler stumbled after a moth across the dry grass, reaching for it joyously. A man serenades his girl with just a ukulele beneath her balcony window.

And the kissing; oh, there was kissing of all kinds. Pecks on the cheek, dry taps on the lips, sweet presses of intention, passionate entanglements…

There were sweet little grandparents kissing amid the applause and tender laughter of their children and grandchildren, and sometimes, great-grandchildren. There were mothers and fathers wishing one another Merry Christmas while the kids played with their toys. There was a young boy noticing the girl he likes under the mistletoe and getting up the courage to kiss her. There were little girls catching and kissing little boys, and babies being kissed by family and friends.

Most of all, there were lovers, at various stages in their relationships, but all deeply, passionately in love, and unable to let each other go. Each image began to pass by faster and faster, no more than seconds before they were somewhere else, watching someone else. Faces began to blur together, and it seemed to Tony that he was no longer looking at strangers, but himself and Pepper in a kaleidoscope of color and light, pinks, and reds, and oranges.

They had been turning in a carousel for he didn't know how long, but Tony stumbled and found himself facing his mother. She was shining with an ethereal light, shining like an inner fire, making her hair and robes look silver, and he realized only then that they were now both completely white. When he moved closer, he saw that the smooth skin of her face belong to a woman much, much, older than she had ever been.

Tony wanted to touch her face but now she looked angelic and she was beautiful and he loved her more than he ever had. He was terrified that after all the time he'd had with her today, that if he tried to stroke her cheek now, or take her hand, she wouldn't really be there.

But either Maria sensed her son's distress, or she felt the same anguish, for she rushed at him, throwing her arms around his waist. Her cheek fit perfectly over the RT. He wrapped his arms around her as well, kissing the crown of his mother's head.

Tipping her head back so that he could see her face, Tony examined Maria's features, drinking them in for what was likely to be the last time. His eyes shone brightly, though the only light came from Maria's spirit. "You're gorgeous, mom," he said quietly. "You don't know how much I've missed you; what I'd do to have you back…"

"Shhh... _figlio mio_. My time has come and gone – and is nearly done again. Remember all you've seen with me, Antony. Remember to embrace love, before it poisons you."

Though Tony was listening, he was staring in curiosity at the robes his mother now wore. They bulged and puffed out awkwardly, as though… "Mom… do you have something under your robes?" He pointed with an embarrassingly shaky finger.

Maria's robes came open along two side slits and out came two women, one on each side. They were scantily clad in bikinis, their faces made up to enhance their sharp, angular features, their hair pulled back tightly into pony tales. The result was that while they were each stunningly beautiful, each like a runway supermodel, they were so in a most frightening way.

Tony stared at them somewhere between fascination and horror. "What… who are they?"

"Listen to me carefully, son. If you do not act soon, there will be great sorrow. These two are your downfall." The women went and wound themselves around various parts of Tony's anatomy.

"What do you mean?" Tony asked, shrinking back from the women. "Mom?"

"Lies, and Infidelity," Maria nodded first to one lady, then the other. "Will bring great sorrow to you, and the one you love most. Mind them both, but pay particular attention to the former, for if you avoid that one, the second's threat is diminished."

Maria started to back into the darkness, slowly fading away. "I love you, _figlio mio_; remember, I am always with you in your heart. You will never lose me there."

"Mom?" Tony looked up quickly, struggling to extract himself from the women holding him. "Don't leave yet, mom? Mom!"

But Maria was already gone, bleeding into the shadows like smoke and in a moment it was like she had never been there.

"Shit!" Tony felt irrationally angry. He'd lost her again, and he wanted to hit something hard.

Behind him, he heard a steady, _'Thud, Thud, Thud'_ of something very large coming his way. Tony turned around slowly and watched as a large, heavily robed, figured, moved toward him. Beneath the dark emptiness of the cowl, the only thing visible was two, glowing red eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

**An Iron Man Christmas Carol ~**

**A Love Story**

_Stave the Fourth_

_In which the protagonist of our story is visited by the last of three Spirits, and learns that the situation is far direr than he knew._

Tony could only remember a few moments in his life when he had truly been afraid. Staring at this last Spirit, striking in its unfamiliarity where the others had been so unrelentingly familiar, he felt a thread of fear trickle through him now.

He was initially struck by its size. Even in his Iron Man armor, the Spirit was still larger than him. But what finally sat the most uneasy with Tony was how utterly silent it was. Because of its size, it had made noise when it moved, but so far, Tony still hadn't even heard it breathing.

"You're the final Spirit I was told would be coming?" he asked, trying to sound nonchalant. The cowl shifted, and Tony realized, with a chill, that the Spirit was nodding. He tried to speak again, but all that came out was a nervous laugh.

"I've gotta admit – I'm more worried about what you have to show me than the Spirits before you," Tony said, uncomfortably, shifting his helmet back and forth between his hands. "The others have shown me some things that…" He paused, but clearing his throat, he straightened up. "They've given me a lot to think about. Whatever you want me to see will be given the same attention."

Turning, with what sounded suspiciously like a creak, the Spirit lifted an arm clad in the heavy folds of his dark, voluminous robes, and pointed into the west.

Was that a flash of metal he saw beneath the Spirit's long sleeve? Obeying the unspoken directive, Tony murmured, "Go west, young man," and started walking that direction, looking toward the Spirit occasionally for guidance. It didn't move to lead him or even keep up with him. The Spirit was content to follow just behind Tony – something he found unsettling.

Not sure where he was going, Tony continued walking west, and shortly he noticed that the world around him had grown quite dim, as though a thick blanket of fog had descended to enfold them in it's recondite impenetrability. But the gloom didn't last long; one moment Tony couldn't see even one inch in front of his nose, the next, he was standing on the sunlit pool deck of the Mondrian Hotel – a place he knew very well.

The Mondrian was home to the Sky Bar, one of the most popular hot spots in Los Angeles on the A-list party circuit. If you were 'somebody', getting a ticket to the rooftop bar, dance floor, and swimming pool, was as easy as showing your I.D., if you even needed to do that. Otherwise, you had to be a guest of the Mondrian, or dining in one of the hotel's two five-star restaurants.

People went to the Sky Bar to see, or be seen. If you weren't famous enough to get in on name recognition alone, you were paying an arm and a leg to gawk at the glitterati, and just maybe, be noticed in return. Tony had done equal amounts of noticing and being noticed here, though usually later in the evening, long after the sun had gone down. At the moment, the sun was still slowly sinking on the horizon, painting the sky there a medley of pinks, oranges, violets, and yellows.

Downtime there was from about six a.m. until two in the afternoon, so there was a nice Cubano beat coming from the bandstand, situation between the bar and pool decks, and nearly everyone had a drink in hand, most of them containing a slice of fruit and a colorful paper umbrella as garnishment.

There were people at the bar, on the dance floor, standing, sitting at tables or on lounge chairs, or hanging off the pool wall everywhere you looked. At first, Tony recognized none of them. It wasn't until he got a better look at a female talk show host he knew (for whom plastic surgery had become more of a burden than a benefit) that he remembered this was the future. How far into the future, he wasn't sure – judging by Ms. Face-Lift, it couldn't have been more than a few years – but Tony looked around again with new eyes, searching faces for signs of familiarity.

The Spirit didn't stop beside Tony, but kept going toward the wooden deck area, on which large, upholstered squares, covered in patches of white, blue, tan, and brown, stood topped with mounds of throw pillows in the same colors. The long two by fours composing the deck didn't bend or creak beneath the Spirit's weight, but Tony was careful to walk a few steps away from him, just in case.

They were approaching a group of women who were in their early thirties, trying to pass for their early twenties. Tony knew them, vaguely, from the party circuit they traveled in. He'd probably even slept with some of them, but the passage of time he hadn't been there to witness and the plastic surgery they'd dabbled in here and there, made it more of an effort to tell than he cared to exert.

One woman in a thong bikini lay on her stomach with her head toward the center of the square on the pile of cushions. A brunette sat beside her on one corner, painting her toenails a vibrant coral color. A third lay on her back along another side of the square, and a forth woman had pulled a lounger close to the group and was lying on her stomach with her head close to her friends. Although her face was buried in the hollow of her folded arms, it was evident from her body language and occasional responses that she could hear everything.

"O-M-G, I completely forgot," the nail-painter was saying. "Did you guys here who bought the farm last night?"

Two of the women turned their faces toward the speaker with curiosity, but the third – the one on the lounge – didn't even open her eyes as she answered, "The Big Bad Wolf, himself – I heard. Whatever are the women of the greater L.A. area to do?"

The petite Japanese woman lying lengthwise on the square, her head near that of the bleach-blonde on the lounge, frowned, her nose scrunching as she turned her head from one of her friends to the other. "He gonna be a farmer?" 

Nail-painter rolled her eyes. "No, May – he's _dead_."

"What was it, Abby - jealous husband?" asked the woman in the thong bikini, still wearing her sunglasses, even though the sun was nearly down.

Abby, the nail-painter, looked morbidly excited to be the one spreading such a prime piece of gossip. "My bell-weights trainer, Enzo, is dating one of the EMT's who answered the emergency call, and he says, it looks like it was," she paused to make sure she quoted exactly. "An alcohol-related incident.' His assistant found him at the bottom of a cliff over the side of one of his balconies with a bottle in his hand, and his neck all ~thquik~" she cocked her head to an unnatural angle and made a sound meant to indicate a broken neck.

Covering her mouth with her hand, May gasped, tears coming to her eyes. "That is so sad! How terrible!"

"Who gets all his money?" the Corey Hart wannabe asked, showing not even a fraction of her friend's sorrow at the news.

The bleach-blonde on the lounge rolled onto her side to join the conversation. "He hasn't given it to me, that's all I know," she said, stretching.

"I'll have to find a dress for the service," Abby mused aloud. "You can wear red to a funeral, right? It's a dark color."

Sunglasses snorted. "You mean you're going?"

May sat up quickly. "I am going too. He was good man and good customer."

"How long were you his masseuse, May?" Abby asked her.

"Three year," May answered. "Paid well. Good tipper."

"I bet he was," Sunglasses muttered, stretching her legs out behind her again.

Swatting her with a pillow, May shook her finger with playful admonishment. "Not like that. Not for last two year, anyway. Then he _really_ Wolf, but not Big Bad. He have heart for only one lady then."

The women fell silent, and Tony, having watched without questioning his companion up to now, frowned. "Whom are they talking about?" he asked the Spirit, tilting his head back a little. The Spirit didn't answer, his attention remaining, as far as Tony could tell, on the women.

"Yeah, and look how well that turned out," the blonde sighed dramatically, as if bored. "He would have been better off staying in the game, or at least going after a woman more his style."

Pulling her sunglasses a short way down her nose, Sunglasses raised an eyebrow. "What, like you, Shannon?"

Shannon laughed throatily. "God, no. I wouldn't take him, no matter how much he's worth. I wanted two things from him, and I got them: a wild night, and a jump-start on my modeling career." With a stretch, she sat up. "Which is why I will also be going to the funeral. It's going to be a media circus, and I can climb a long way up the ladder on that kind of gossip. Especially if I ask my sister if I can borrow her little girl for the day."

The women laughed.

There was a flash of metal, and a heavy hand fell on Tony's shoulder. The scene faded away in front of them, receding into the distance accompanied by the tin can sound of the women's mirth.

Surrounded by clouds of mist that did not feel heavy or moist against his skin, Tony only had a moment to brave the discomfort of that uneasy darkness till they were moving again – or rather not moving, but shifting. The steely gray of the mist dissolved into industrial gray walls, the familiar dark blue and white of S.H.I.E.L.D. uniforms moving purposefully around them telling him instantly where they were.

The Spirit proceeded down the corridor, which ended at the entrance to a room that look eerily, Tony thought, like a turn of the century school room. At one end sat a large desk, flanked behind and on either side by an American flag, and a S.H.I.E.L.D. flag. Facing the big desk were about two dozen folding chairs with attached, foldable desk arms, standing at attention like soldiers.

Nick Fury sat at a slight angle atop the large desk, his imposing, black beetle eye shining with anticipation as he looked over the assemblage, although his posture on it's own would have indicated that he was bored and impatient.

Directly in front of Fury, wearing a black, latex catsuit and sprawled in one of the chairs in a way that Tony felt had to be illegal somewhere, was a gorgeous woman with red hair a darker shade than Pepper's, and hazel eyes that were large, startling, and nearly impossible to read. If Fury was able to convey boredom, this woman exuded it like a pheromone from her skin, only making you want to try harder to impress her.

Agent Phil Coulson was there as well, his usual crisp suit traded in for the regulation uniform today. He sat near the woman with the desk arm of his chair down, a small notebook open as if he were reviewing last week's notes before class.

A fourth man entered the room – one Tony had never seen before. He was massive – large, without managing to also look fat, though he had the rounded features for it. His hair and mustache were a bright, carroty red and, as if to insist that he wasn't already an interesting enough looking man, he wore a bowler hat.

It was this man that they were apparently waiting on.

"Dugan," Fury grinned, bumping fists with the other man in a way that instantly told Tony that in spite of the other man's size, his familiarity with Fury meant that he was not a man to be trifled with. "Make yourself comfortable. I'm anxious to see what you've brought for me," he added, addressing the room at large.

Tony and the Ghost of Christmas Future had entered at the rear of the large room, but moved only close enough that they were within twenty feet of the four people.

Phil Coulson stood quickly, whether in a hurry, or just eager to impress, his impassive face gave Tony no clue.

"What have you got for me?" Fury asked, wearing the barest curve of a smile.

The agent didn't smile at all. "I was able to procure the following security codes to all of the subject's personal and corporate holdings and materials previously inaccessible to us, including all projects designated One-A-Zero-TSIM-Zero-X." Handing Fury the notebook he had been paging through earlier, he stood at attention as though waiting for permission to go, or a review on his performance.

Fury's eyebrows rose. Opening the book, he looked over the contents. "We could have used these a year and a half ago," he commented. Coulson said nothing, but it was apparent Fury didn't expect him to. "Now, you know they're gonna be changing these codes faster than we'll get a chance to make any good use of them."

"I don't believe that will be the case, Colonel," Coulson said, unperturbed. "Given the upheaval of the last two weeks within the organization, the recent deaths, it's my belief that no one will have prepared for an eventuality of this magnitude and their recovery time will be severely affected. In the midst of these unforeseen events, we should have plenty of time to do what needs to be done without anyone being the wiser."

Fury glanced at the woman. "Romanov?"

The redhead's face was a mask of indifference. "Phil's right. Both of those most knowledgeable and most qualified to lead them are gone now, and no one expected that to happen. It will take time to regroup, and they'll focus on the industry long before they think about the private quarters." The faintest trace of a Russian accent colored the edges of her voice.

"Well done, Agent Coulson," Fury said with an approving nod in the man's direction. With a weak smile and echoing nod, Phil made a gesture that involved clicking his heels together with a shallow bow of his head, and excusing himself from the room.

"What have you got for me, Natasha?" the Colonel turned his attention back to the Russian.

For the first time, Agent Romanov's face showed some life. A mischievous smirk curved her lips and made her eyes dance. "Nothing much," her voice was nonchalant. "Only a closet full of new suits for you to try on."

This didn't sound very impressive to Tony, but the surprise on Fury's face, and the delighted burst of laughter as he rocked back where he sat on the table, made it seem like this was the best Christmas present he'd ever received.

"All of them? Tell me you got all of them."

She made a circular gesture with her hand, waving away the question. "Of course. You had me studying the place long enough for insertion. I had to put that knowledge to use somehow and come away from my undercover assignment with something better than the affair, and then..."

Fury nodded. "You don't have to tell me, Nat." He sounded sympathetic. "None of us saw it coming until it was too late to stop it."

Looking at the woman, Natasha, Tony saw in her eyes that she didn't believe it, but the expression vanished instantly. He wished he understood what was going on.

"_Glupyi_," Romanov muttered. "Foolish."

"Yeah, well, we knew that about him a long time ago, didn't we?" said Dugan from where he'd positioned himself, slouched in the corner, chewing on the end of an unlit cigar."

"And what did you bring Uncle Fury, Dum Dum?" Natasha asked. She turned in her chair to see him better and her voice matched the movement of her body – sinuous and sensual, enticing without actually trying to be seductive. A perfectly arched eyebrow curved above one eye, and the bow of her lips made her look like a kewpie doll.

Dugan looked at her and snorted in amusement before focusing on the Colonel. "Gotcha the big brain." There was no explanation, no further editorializing, he simple picked up a black box about the size of a toaster and tossed it at the gaping bald man.

Fury stared from Dugan to the box in his hands. "… this can't be all of it."

Another snort. "Course not; thing's the size'a two sub-zero's side-by-side. Had 'im taken straight to the Helicarrier for safekeeping. Just so you know," he added, giving Fury a warning look. "He didn't come easy. You hook it all back up, no telling what kind of information you'll get out of that smart-ass abacus."

Shaking his head incredulously, Fury was grinning. "Don't matter. Ain't _nobody _got one of these. I can't believe you made off with something like this, Tim."

"Just so you know," Dugan shrugged. "Not like it's going to do him any good anymore, is it?"

"Nope," Fury agreed. "Still, pretty bold move, though - all of you. Saved us a lot a trouble, dying like that. Damned considerate of him."

As Fury and Dugan laughed and Natasha rolled her eyes, a light smirk of amusement on her face, the heavy hand fell on Tony's shoulder again, distracting him from the roiling of his stomach caused by the callous disregard for the life of whatever man S.H.I.E.L.D. was essentially grave-robbing.

Their surrounding began to fade into a thick mist again, and Tony tried to turn around and see his companion, but could not even make out the hand on his shoulder beyond the faintest outline.

"Why are you showing me this? Who is the person the women and Fury's group are all talking about?"

Getting no answer, Tony pressed on.

"This man… am I in danger of sharing his fate? Of losing everything? Is that it?"

They didn't appear to be going anywhere, but the Spirit didn't seem to be forthcoming with answers to Tony's questions either.

"Can't you show me someone who isn't an opportunistic asshole over death? I mean – just some emotion associated with death that's… pure?"

The hand on his shoulder tightened and with a jerk than made him nauseous, Tony stumbled and reached out only to grab hold of a familiar chair in a room he had been in only hours before.

Rhodey sat bent forward in one of the other overstuffed chairs in his living room, a long-necked bottle of a beer held loosely in his fingers and dangling between his knees. His head hung low against his chest, and Tony had known his friend long enough to recognize that he was well on his way to being smashed.

On the couch across from him with a matching beer bottle sat Brandon, one of Tony and Rhodey's friends from M.I.T. Brandon's eyes were focused on the other man with concern, but he didn't immediately voice any suggestion for remedy. Or so Tony thought.

"I don't understand," Brandon said. "What the hell happened?"

Rhodey's laugh was short and empty. Tony had never heard him sound so despondent.

"What happened is Tony fucked up," Rhodey said harshly.

At his words, Tony sat down in a neighboring chair, completely focused on his friend, a sense of foreboding heavy upon him.

"I warned him too," Rhodey added. "I told him if he wasn't fast enough, some slick motherfucker was gonna move in and snatch Pepper out from under him, but he was too…" he searched for a word but with a deflated sigh, settled with, "scared. The bastard was too damn scared to admit he loved her and sure enough, she met someone who wasted no time in scooping her up and marrying her."

Brandon shook his head, taking a swig of beer. "I gotta admit I'm surprised someone was willing to compete with her job."

"Jesse's an actor." Rhodey rubbed his face as Tony growled, hearing the familiar name. "He was in New York a lot, filming for different shows, so he made sure to call when he was going to be home so she'd make an effort to be there." With a rough laugh, he added, "I'm sure that only made the affair that much easier on her and Tony."

Tony leapt to his feet, whirling to look at the Spirit, then Rhodey, then the Spirit, then Rhodey again. "What affair?" He turned to the Spirit once more. "I thought this was supposed to be about a death?" Looking at Rhodey again, he moved closer, as though he could influence his friend with his nearness. "Dammit, Sour Patch, start talking, or I swear to God, I'm-"

"Wow," Brandon interrupted, of course, unknowingly. "Affair? How did that happen? He finally got up the nerve _after_ the fact?"

With an exasperated shake of his head, Rhodey leaned back in his chair. "Tony _never_ did something easy if there was a hard way to do it. He told me, much later, of course, that they were working extra late one night and argued about her husband.

"Jesse was in New York, filming a few episodes for a show he has a reoccurring role on, and the way I understand it, Tony didn't like that he left her alone so often," Rhodey explained with a disbelieving snort. "More likely he _loved_ that Jesse was away all the time because it meant she didn't have to worry about getting home for any other reason, but he probably didn't approve of someone other than himself having Pepper, and not devoting everything to her. No matter how unreasonable that was."

Tony wanted to scream at his friend to get on with it, but he did stop to think about Rhodey's musings. It sounded about right. No matter how much he talked about there being someone better out there for Pepper, if he were to lose her to anyone, he knew he would be horribly jealous about having to share her. Anything that gave him the edge in her schedule would make him inclined to gloat. But if it were at the expense of Pepper being treated with all the deference she deserved, it would piss him off.

Rhodey continued. "Anyway, Tony was ranting and Pepper was asking why it was any of his business in the first place, and his only answer was to grab her and kiss her like a man dying of thirst and she the only source of water."

Gaping at him, Brandon asked the question that was on Tony's mind, too. "What did she do?"

"He didn't actually give her a whole lot of time to react." Rhodey emptied his beer bottle and fished for another in the small ice cooler on one side of the coffee table that Tony just realized was there, ready for a full day doing more of the same.

"Surprisingly, he backed off and started apologizing. He told me she just stood there staring at him, not running away like he expected, but just holding on to his shirt and looking at him until at last she just quietly said, 'No'. He wasn't sure if she meant, 'No, we can't do this,' or 'No, don't stop', but the next thing he knew, they were kissing again, and then on the couch…"

The scene was so clear in Tony's mind, it made his stomach tighten with equal parts shame and longing.

"Damn," Brandon exclaimed, shaking his head. "What shitty timing. They kept it going then, I'm assuming?"

Rhodey nodded. "Quite a while, though I had no idea. Whenever Jesse left home, she was with Tony. Pepper loved Jesse, but even I could tell that she would always love Tony more, and I had no clue what was going on right under my nose."

Brandon was frowning. "I don't understand. I thought – didn't Tony love her?"

Another snort. "Hell yes, Tony loved her. I think it terrified him, just how much he loved her. And Pepper… well, any woman would be crazy to work for Tony as long or as hard as she did if she didn't love him. There wasn't a whole lot either of them wouldn't do for each other."

"How could he stand to let her go back to him?" Brandon asked, still frowning curiously. "That's the part… I don't think I'd be able to watch that happen over and over."

"Guilt." Rhodey looked a little sick. "For both of them, I'd guess. "They didn't want to hurt – well – Pepper didn't want to hurt Jesse, and Tony didn't want to hurt Pepper… or to make her feel guiltier for cheating on her husband. You know what I mean. But looking back, the only time the two of them were really happy and not stressing themselves out about something was during those times they were together and Jesse was gone. I didn't see it then, but everything was pretty peaceful at those times. I should have known. I should have seen that they'd finally figured out that all their tension was sexual and started doing something about it."

"Would you have tried to stop them if you had known?"

With a scowl, Rhodey twirled his beer bottle, staring into it at the amber liquid. "I don't know. I loved those two like family, and if they were happy… but, on the other hand," he sighed, "knowing how the story turned out…"

Tony dug his nails into his palms to fight the urge to get up and pace.

"You said Tony fucked up," Brandon prompted.

Rhodey snorted, scratching his forehead with his thumbnail. "What, even more than waiting until Pepper was married to tell her how he felt, or for having an affair with his assistant, a married woman, who was also one of the few people in the world who trusted him? Yeah, Tony fucked up big time. Pepper got pregnant."

"Holy shit!" Brandon exclaimed.

"Holy shit!" Tony was on his feet and halfway to the liquor cabinet before he remembered Rhodey only stocked it for parties, and that he wasn't really there anyway. Casting a baleful look at the Spirit, Tony was too cagey to sit, prowling near the two men like a wild animal as they talked.

"Was it Tony's?" Brandon asked, oddly, a question that hadn't even occurred to Tony.

Rhodey shook his head. "There was no way to tell for sure at the time, but Tony said that he knew it was his, and so did Pepper. She left work early for a doctor's appointment, which had him going crazy, because Pepper never went to the doctor for anything unless it was life threatening. Jesse was due back that night, so Tony didn't expect to see her until she came in to work the next day, but he'd planned on calling her in the middle of the night, once he thought of a good enough excuse.

"Pepper showed up at his house instead to tell him before anyone else that she was gonna have a baby." He laughed shallowly. "Whatever she expected from Tony, it probably wasn't his complete joy at the idea of being a father; No, of being the father of _her_ child. Fool man proposed to her immediately, never mind that she was already married, and that the kid might be the other guy's."

"So, she said no," Brandon nodded sympathetically.

Rhodey paused, taking a slow breath. "…No, actually, she told him yes." There was a very faint smile in acknowledgement of his friend's shock. "But she had what Tony called 'rules' though." He made quotation marks in the air with his fingers. "She didn't want Tony, the company, or especially the baby saddled with any of the stigma that would be aimed at them if she left her husband as a pregnant woman, _and_ Tony's assistant, only to immediately establish herself as his lover. She wanted the baby to be as free from that kind of speculation as possible, and so she wanted to stay with Jesse through the pregnancy, letting him think the baby was his, and then once the baby had been born, file for divorce."

The room was quiet for a minute.

"That… seems… unusually cruel," Brandon commented finally.

For another moment, Rhodey didn't answer. Then, he exhaled heavily. "Tony thought so too. They argued about it." In a long swallow, he drained another bottle, as if he needed much more alcohol to continue with this story. "He told me that he wasn't just thinking about himself, but about Jesse. He thought it was wrong to let the guy prepare for a future with a wife and child, only to take that away from him. But Tony also hated the idea that Jesse would forever be known as the father of _his_ kid, and he couldn't understand why Pepper would deny him something like that."

Tony, watching and listening, sank into a chair, his heart sinking into his stomach at the same time. He understood why she did it, and he wondered if he was corporeal enough to be sick.

"One thing's for sure," Rhodey went on. "No matter what happened, Pepper would not have come out of it smelling like roses, you know what I'm saying? Either she's some kinda loose woman who cheated on her husband, with her boss, no less, or she's a capricious nutcase who leaves one man for another without thinking twice, just after giving birth to the first man's baby."

"But at least in the second case, there's less controversy over the baby," Brandon nodded in understanding. "It's all fucked, man."

Rhodey snorted, shaking his head. "Neither of them liked it, but the alternatives were that they split up and let Pep raise the baby as Jesse's – and at that point, I don't think either of them were actually capable of doing that – or causing a scandal in the paper for Tony, the company, and forever stigmatizing their kid. He or she would never be free of the stink of something like that."

Massaging the sides of his nose, Brandon exhaled heavily. "So they argued over it," he stated. "Then what happened?"

"She went home," Rhodey stated grimly. The words fell on Tony's ears like a death knell, making him shiver.

"I'm not a hundred percent on what happened once she got there," Rhodey continued. "What I do know is that Jesse was already there when she arrived, and she told him she was pregnant. First thing _he_ asked was if it was his, or Tony's?

"Seems he'd gotten home two days early and when she didn't come home, he'd just sat there waiting for her which, when he heard about it, made Tony crazy. If Pepper was even five minutes late to work, which she rarely was, he was ready to call out the National Guard, so for Jesse to wait two days till she came home without even calling her? Anyway, by the time Pepper did get there, Jesse had pretty much figured out where she'd been, and why."

That sense of foreboding came over Tony again, and he scooted to the edge of his seat, his emotions just as on edge. He was eager for Rhodey to hurry up and continue, but just as ready for him to stop the story, finished or not.

Rhodey's eyes were closed. "They must've fought pretty bad. She was already upset from arguing with Tony, and then to turn around and have an even worse confrontation with her husband, whom she'd wanted to believe was her child's father?" He opened his fifth beer since Tony and the Spirit had arrived. "At some point, she threw some stuff in a bag and grabbed some work clothes, threw it all in the car, and tore out of there, back down the road and up the hills to Tony's."

Tony's mouth went dry. "No."

"It wasn't raining that night," Rhodey was staring at the floor. "But the fog was heavy, and the roads are usually pretty slick around there. She must've been upset, too – maybe she was crying and couldn't see too clearly…"

"Please, God, no…" Tony stood up, despite the pain cramping his stomach. He took a stumbling step toward Rhodey.

"They found her car the next morning about five miles away from Tony's house up on Point Dume. They think another car came around the turn going the opposite direction with its high beams on, and the glare off all the moisture plus her presumed stress level…"

"Take me to her," Tony demanded, whirling around on the Spirit so quickly he felt drunk. Tell me Pepper's alright and take me to wherever she is, now!"

The Spirit shook his head, denying his demand, but Tony wasn't having it. He threw himself at the ghost, and everything shifted again as Tony forced his companion to take him where he wanted to go.

At first, all he could see were the black folds of the Spirit's cloak, obscuring his surroundings, but as Tony turned around, he felt his heart freeze in his chest.

They were standing facing an enormous stone angel, its widespread wings looming over the rest of the cemetery.

"Noooo." Tony sank to his knees with a moaned sob, knowing without having to read the inscription that he was looking at the grave of Pepper Potts. Needing to see for himself but dreading to at the same time, he slowly scuttled to his feet and inched forward until his fingers were tracing the delicately carved words:

_Virginia Grace "Pepper" Potts Howell_

_Beloved Friend and Wife_

"_I have loved to the point of madness; _

_That which is called madness, _

_That which to me, is the only sensible way to love.__"_

Choking back a second sob, he rested his head against the marble. She really is dead. Pepper dies, and he as good as kills her. Tony's greatest fear had long been that Pepper would somehow be hurt, or worse, because of him. It was one of the reasons he'd convinced himself things were better for everyone if he kept his feelings for his assistant to himself. It hit him hard now that he'd been selectively ignoring the fact that she was in danger either way, and keeping her at a distance emotionally only kept her further away physically, too – where he couldn't protect her.

And life was short. He was a fool to have denied them both something they wanted, just because he thought it was better. In reality, he was nothing more than a scared little boy, who would have been petulant and resentful toward anyone who had tried to take his place in her life. He loved her.

He loved her.

"I'm sorry, Pep," he whispered, flattening his palm against the stone. "I'm so sorry. I should've…"

"You should've done a lot of things, Tony."

The unexpected voice, although strange and metallic, was chillingly familiar. Frozen in place against the monument, it took time for Tony to will himself to turn around and face the nightmare he now knew, with deadly certainty, would be there.

The black cloak had fallen to puddle in the ground at the Spirit's feet – or rather, its large metal boots. The armored suit was oversized and rough looking – exactly as Tony remembered it the last time he'd seen the Iron Monger, Obadiah Stane.

"Stane," Tony growled.

Lifting the helmet off of his head, Stane gave Tony a familiar, self-satisfied grin. "You know, I never could figure out why you didn't get yourself a piece of that. I always figured she was either some kind of a lesbian, or else she really was the most frigid woman on the planet."

Obadiah Stane had been a friend of his family for as long as Tony could remember. He had trusted the man; relied on him; loved him like an uncle, and Obie had betrayed him. Not only had he tried to steal control of Stark Industries from him, Stane had also been the man responsible for Tony's kidnapping and near assassination in Afghanistan.

He was the reason Tony now lived with a battery in his chest. He had tried to kill Tony a second, and even a third time before Tony had been forced to kill him in self defense, and he had even tried to kill Pepper. Yet _this_ was the third Spirit sent to teach Tony the error of his ways – a man for whom money and power were everything, sent to advise him about love.

"Truth is, you were never interested, were you, son? Not unless anyone else was showing an interest in her. Hell, you even wait until she's married before finally sticking it to her."

Tony's jaw hurt, he was gritting his teeth so hard. "Shut up. You don't know what you're talking about.

Obie put his hands up, huge in their gauntlets, as if surrendering. "Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming you," he chuckled. "Once I'd had you killed, I'd planned on plugging that myself, eventually. But you just wouldn't stay dead, would you? Well," he grinned widely, walking toward the monument on the grave next to Pepper's. "Not then, at least."

"Keep talking about her like that, and I'll…"

It was then that he realized that the marble angel next to Pepper's was no angel at all. What he'd seen peripherally and mistaken for wings folded tight against an angel's back was a gust of wind carried along in the wake of a rocketing Iron Man.

A cold chill settled over Tony as he stared at the effigy, growing stronger as he watched Stane looking at it with undisguised glee.

"There's an inquest, you know; after Pepper's death? Seems that some people have questions about what really happens the night her car goes over that cliff. Some people – no," he laughed, enjoying his own private joke. "_Most_ people, are pretty sure you had something to do with it; that you fought and forced her over that cliff in a fit of jealous rage."

Roaring with anguish and fury, Tony launched himself at Stane, dropping his helmet on Pepper's grave as he blindly reached for the other man's head. He had no goal; in their suits, the attack he was making wasn't the most effective one he could make, but the intensity of his sudden mania clouded his judgment to any rational thought.

The sheer enormity of the Iron Monger's gauntlet in comparison to the Iron Man armor as a whole made it possible for Stane to grab Tony by the neck as he flew at him. Yelling in pain and outrage, Tony struggled against his former mentor's grasp, staring down at the man's wide, toothy grin with complete loathing.

"No charges are ever filed against you though, Tony," Stane taunted, tightening his grip around Tony's throat, making him stiffen for a moment, then wriggle like a fish on a hook. "You wanna know why?" Without waiting for an answer, he whirled around and slammed Tony face first into the marble Iron Man effigy.

Tony felt his nose shatter, and the warm gush of blood as it shot from his nostrils, down over his lips and chin. He didn't feel the pain right away, so shocked was he at being injured in this future spirit world.

"Read it, Tony," Stane challenged in a clearly mocking voice. "Surely a genius such as yourself can figure it out from all I've shown you."

The women coldly discussing the dead man and his funeral; a man who broke his neck falling over his balcony to the cliffs below while intoxicated, only to be found the next morning by his assistant… Natalie?

Colonel Nick Fury and his coterie of agents raiding a dead man's house of security codes, suits, and other technical devices – of J.A.R.V.I.S., he realized.

Rhodey drinking himself into a stupor, talking about Pepper – and _him_ in the past tense, only he'd been so focused on getting to where Pepper was, he hadn't made the connection.

To the right of his cheek was a name Tony was now expecting to see:

_Anthony Edward Stark_

'_Iron Man'_

"_We all die. The goal isn't to live forever, the goal is to create something that will."_

The date of his death was little more than a week after Pepper's. Stane released him and Tony slid to the earth, bonelessly. "It's me," he moaned softly. "I'm dead."

"You're not just dead," Stane gloated, crouching over him. "You die in a blaze of truly unconscionable insignificance. You were this century's Golden Boy, man, and here you went and lost your mind over a piece of tail, when you could have had any other in the city, and at least several other cities. You had it all and you had no idea what to do with it. Which is why I tried to take it from you."

"You're wrong," Tony muttered low under his breath. A cold flood of violence rose in him, and he threw himself at Stane again. "You're wrong! And you could _never_ have had her!"

Stane flew back a few feet, laughing in amusement at Tony's efforts. "Come on; she dies, and all you can do is drink yourself to death. I can't believe you'll actually feel _that_ guilty over stealing another man's wife. You know you choose her plot, her tombstone – you even choose the engraving? You should see the look on Pepper's husband's face when he tries to buy the plot next to hers and finds out you're already moving into it."

Tony scrambled across the grass for his helmet and shoved it on his head, swearing loudly when he jarred his nose, sending another splash of blood down his face.

Laughing at him, Stane put his own helmet on, just in time to counter a burst from Tony's repulsor beams with one of his own.

The blast hit one of the wings of Pepper's angel, only making Tony madder. Taking to the air, he circled behind the Iron Monger, overhead "You never deserved any of what you tried to take from me," he challenged in Iron Man's tinny voice. "You only would have abused it, Stane. I'll never let that happen."

"You _did_ let that happen," Stane countered, rising into the air to circle in the opposite direction. "I was doing it for years right under your nose." Pulling an obelisk from the earth – someone's monument – Iron Monger swung it in Tony's direction.

Instead of dodging, Tony braced himself and grabbed for the monolith, catching it with a grunt. Throwing his body around hard, he caught Stane off guard, swinging the obelisk like an enormous baseball bat. Before the other man could let go of his end, Tony had him soaring through the air, sending him crashing headfirst into a mausoleum.

To Tony's shock, it barely seemed to faze him. Stane stumbled from the broken façade of the mausoleum, looking little more than scratched. "It's you who doesn't deserve the company, Tony," he called back. The head of a cherub the size of a bowling ball rolled to a stop at his feet and Stane hurled it at the younger man.

"Let's face it; you chose death over a life where you had wealth, fame, cars, a mansion, and all the sweet, young, cunt you could possibly want."

Tony dodged, but the stone head exploded against his shoulder, covering his helmet in a fine mist of silt. It covered his main viewers, and in the seconds it took him to reconfigure, Tony blindly fired two repulsor blasts in Stane's direction.

"You didn't give two shits for it when you had it, except that it made your life more comfortable." Firing a repulsor blast of his own and attempting to lift the two-ton granite roof off the mausoleum, Stane couldn't get out of the way in time. Tony's repulsor blasts caught him in the thinner plating of the neck and groin.

With a bellow of frustration, Stane threw the roof slab like a discus, then leapt after it, aiming to land in the center of the stone. "Then you throw it all away for a dead girl who wasn't yours, and who, if you were actually capable of loving anybody but yourself, you should have gone after _before_ she finally wised up and married someone who wasn't you, making you want her just because you couldn't have her."

Tony moved to intercept Stane, roaring like a wounded animal, but the greater size and weight of Stane and the added momentum of the stone sent him crashing back to the ground with the mass on top of him. With Stane crouched atop it, Tony struggled to shove the weight off of him.

"Liar," Tony ground out in a guttural voice. "That's all you've ever been, Stane, a fucking _liar_!" A growing, furious burst of rage lent him the strength and motivation he needed. "No," he amended. "You're even sadder than that. It's _you _who doesn't know how to love, isn't is?"

Stane fell backward with a grunt and, as the roof fell sideways, Tony picked Stane up by the arms and flew him backward into the wall surrounding the cemetery.

"I've loved lots of people," Tony yelled with growing realization, just before punching Stane.

Stane laughed, wrapping his massive hands around Tony's biceps and sweeping him around in a half-circle, taking out half a dozen headstones. "No, you've fucked lots of people. It's still all about self-gratification there, son."

The uni-beam from the arc reactor in the center of Tony's chest increased its luminosity one hundred percent, and the beam that shot out sent Stane a quarter of a mile into the air, through the fronds of a small copse of palm trees, and crashing through the skylight of a nearby vault.

"I loved my father – even if he _was_ an asshole!"

Tony was already stalking that direction when Stane burst through the doors, tearing them from their hinges. Blasting the cars from the street, Stane grabbed two of them and slammed them together like cymbals on either side of Tony.

Taking to the air, Tony's legs were caught by the smashing cars, but with a wrathful yell, he fired repulsor blasts from his boots, aiming for the gas tanks and used the momentum to jet out of the way as the fuel ignited, engulfing Stane in blue-green flame.

"I loved my mother – even if she didn't always take as much time for me as I wanted her to!"

Stane was mostly protected by the suit, but he screamed in surprise as fire licked in at him in the places where Tony had early damaged the more flexible areas of his armor.

"I loved Yinsen – even if he was stupid enough to sacrifice his life for mine. I love Rhodey, even if he doesn't always understand, and Happy. I loved Sunset – I even loved _your_ murderous, back-stabbing ass, Obie."

Tony stopped, landing beside Stane as he collapsed to the ground, his screams high and strangled. Crouching down, heedless of the fire in his own suit, Tony lowered his voice. "And if I've learned anything in the last twenty-four hours, it's that there is one person that I am _madly_ in love with. You wanna know who that is?"

Stane didn't answer. Instead, with a renewed shout that could only be described as a battle cry, he lunged for Tony, grabbing him by the neck and shooting into the air. Fed by the oxygen, the flames grew.

Tony still had no fear of burning to death, but with the fire growing, engulfing him as well as Stane, the oxygen was being eaten more rapidly than his suit could filter and regenerate the CO2 into something he could breathe safely. They were moving at breakneck speed, and as Tony looked around for some means of escape, he saw where they were headed and his blood ran cold.

As he and Stane plunged into the lake in the center of the cemetery, their heavy armor dragging them down to the bottom, Tony could think of only one thing.

"_Pepper…_"

_**Author's Note**__: The epitaph on Pepper's grave, chosen by Tony after her death, is from a poem by Francoise Sagan. She probably had her own funeral planned out, but he overruled her plan (and her husband's) in favor of his own._

_The epitaph on Tony's grave, chosen by Pepper and outlined in his Emergency Funeral Preparation Plan file, is a quote by Chuck Palahniuk_


	5. Chapter 5

**An Iron Man Christmas Carol ~**

**A Love Story**

_Stave the Fifth_

_In which the protagonist of our story gets a second chance to make things right._

The pressure in Tony's suit grew unbearable as he and Stane were dragged deeper into the lake. There had to be a bottom somewhere, but it felt like they were sinking on and on without end. He tried to struggle away from Stane, but the Iron Monger kept a death grip on him in spite of the holes in his suit, which had to mean water was seeping in.

There was only one chance, and it was risky. Despite the battle, Stane was his guide. Maybe he should just trust…

The image of Pepper being attacked by the Iron Monger appeared in his head, and he remembered Stane telling him not too long ago, what he would have done to Pepper, had Tony stayed dead.

'Hell no.'

Using all of the energy he had remaining in his suit, Tony fired off both of the repulsor beams in his boots, shooting upward and away from Stane as fast and as powerfully as possible. Leaving boots and helmet for last, he began manually stripping the armor from his body – a process that was difficult and slow without tools. Water began to fill the cavities as pieces of the shell fell away, making Tony work faster before the level climbed up over his mouth and nose.

As the momentum from the repulsor blasts began to die, Tony kicked off the boots. Looking upward, he tried to get a reading on how much further off the surface was, because it had to be close. They couldn't have sunk that far.

What the HUD display showed made Tony's stomach tighten with ice-cold fear. According to his sensors, there _was_ no surface. The lake continued to rise above him into infinity with no end in sight.

Water was already beginning to fill the helmet, but he wasn't ready to give up just yet. Kicking powerfully, Tony shot upward, desperate to get up, to get out, to get home and get to Pepper. It was a fight against the pull of the water, and he didn't realize his nose was almost completely submerged along with his mouth until he drew in a deep pull of air and water came with it.

Taking a last, slow breath before he no longer could, Tony kept the helmet on until the water obscured his vision too and it became more of a hindrance than an aid. Yanking it off, he pushed it to one side and ignoring the burn beginning in his lungs, gave another big kick.

His vision blurred, and Tony realized he'd stopped swimming, floating instead, just drifting with the water's flow. He wanted to scream; he almost did, but at the last moment, his oxygen deprived mind remembered why that would be a bad idea.

He'd lost his sense of direction; not sure if he was swimming up or down, Tony used the last of his energy to kick again, each stroke weaker than the last, but he managed to keep himself going longer than he thought he would by silently chanting the mantra, _'Pepper, Pepper, Pepper…'_.

When he finally couldn't hold off any longer, and water filled his lungs as he gasped for air, Pepper's face was the last thought in his head.

Tony's body spasmed in its' death throes…

…and he jerked awake in his bed, sitting up fast and gasping for the air he needed.

He could have spent hours just breathing – something else Tony now realized he'd taken for granted far too long.

'_Good morning, Mr. Stark. The time is six-oh-eight a.m. on December the twenty-fifth, two thousand ten. Happy Christmas, sir. The temperature is currently at fifty-one degrees Fahrenheit, with highs at fifty-seven and lows at forty-eight degrees. Rain is expected starting in the afternoon, with visibility…'_

J.A.R.V.I.S. was working again. _J.A.R.V.I.S._ was working again. "J.A.R.V.I.S!" Tony interrupted the A.I.'s usual morning spiel. "Did you take the night off while the house turned into Grand Central Station, man?"

J.A.R.V.I.S. stopped. He sounded offended. _'I'm sorry, Mr. Stark, I'm afraid I don't understand the question. I haven't "been" anywhere, sir.'_

"Never mind," Tony put his feet on the floor, sliding them into his slippers. "Run a diagnostic on yourself and let me know if you find any abnormalities. What day did you say it was?" He had another moment to wonder, again, if he'd dreamt the whole thing.

'_It's Christmas Day, sir.'_

Tony went completely still, the words of Yinsen, his father, his mother, even Stane, running through his head. Part of him wanted to believe that none of it was real, that it was just a very strange nightmare, but as he got out of bed and went to look out the window at the still darkened world beyond, a few things occurred to him.

One, whatever else was true, Tony could no longer deny that he was in love with Pepper Potts. He didn't know if they were both destined to end up dead if he continued to say nothing, but if there was a chance that his stupidity would lead to her death, he needed to man up. He understood one thing very clearly: Tony knew _why_ his future self would drink himself to death; living without Pepper just wasn't an option.

Two, he… didn't actually _want_ to deny it anymore. He knew it meant an end to the carousel of women, and that he'd have to work through a lot of things before his past experiences with monogamy didn't scare him from it. But he wanted Pepper, and not just in a physical way. He wanted her to be the woman who grew old with him, should he be so lucky, and he wanted to be the last man to make her heart beat faster. Tony wanted all of that, and he was terrified by how much he wanted it. But ghost or dream - that was what last night had been about… right?

Which led to number three; that if he was going to finally tell Pepper that he loved her, there was no time like the present. The longer he sat on it, the more chances he'd have to miss his opportunity, or talk himself out of it. Besides – if what his mother showed him were true, then today was the day Jesse was going to kiss _his_ Pepper. Tony was _not_ going to let that happen. Today was _his_ day.

The wonder of the night just past washed over him and Tony felt a sudden euphoria flood his chest, like the water he'd just dreamt – it had been a dream, hadn't it? – he'd been swimming though just minutes before.

Opening the door to his bedroom, Tony tore though the house, searching for remnants of his dream; some sign that his mother had actually been there and was not just a figment of his overworked, fevered imagination.

The food, jewelry, lingerie, birds, chocolates, candles – everything from before that had accompanied her presence were now gone, as much a phantom as his mother had been. There was the chair she had sat in while playing one of her favorite Christmas songs on the harp, clad in a beautiful dress of crimson and green. Now the chair stood vacant, and Tony's memory of her there was so tangible that the fact that she was not where he'd hoped she'd be made him want to cry.

Sitting in her place and looking slowly around the room at the piano, at the fireplace ledge, and all the other surfaces that had only hours ago in his memory been laden with symbols of love, Tony's hand dropped to his side and brushed against something hard and unfamiliar.

He kept his living spaces Spartan - clutter-free except for the lab, and he knew exactly what and where everything in his house was.

But Tony did not know was what he was touching or why it was there, until he lifted it from where it was tucked beneath the chair and lifted it onto his lap - where he saw that it was a wooden harp… his mother's, to be exact.

Shaky fingers traced the gilt frame for exactly three seconds before Tony leapt to his feet, the harp placed delicately on the chair behind him for later consideration. The man of the house raced back up the stairs to his room, scrambling bodily over the bed for his cell phone and then hurtled into the closet, dialing awkwardly with one hand as he pulled on clothes with the other. His voice occasionally became muffled as he attempted to make plans for the day ahead, not well versed in doing so for himself, but determined that everything must be set up perfectly if he were going to do this right.

At the last minute, he remembered something else. "J.A.R.V.I.S., can you tell me where the nearest liquor store is that's open today?" It was still early enough, he had plenty of time.

'_There's a Beverages & More on La Sal Boulevard at 3__rd__ Street, Mr. Stark..'_

"Great." Grabbing a jacket, Tony jogged down to the lab and hopped in the Audi V8. He had one duty to fulfill before turning all of his attention to wooing Pepper, and it would require copious amounts of beer.

Rhodey wasn't sure what surprised him most: that it was Tony knocking at his door just as brunch began, or that he had a keg of fine, imported ale on either side of him.

Tony looked slightly abashed, even putting his hands in his pockets and tucking his head. "Does the invite still stand? I thought about it, and I… I mean…" he took a deep breath. "I'd really like to celebrate with you guys for a while, if that's okay."

Still stunned, Rhodey grinned and offered his best friend a hand, pulling Tony into a backslapping hug. "I see no reason why it wouldn't be." Grabbing one of the kegs to help carry them to the kitchen, Rhodey called into the other room where the guests were gathered, "Hey, guess who decided to show after all? Though he's foisting on us some a' that fancy imported beer. Drink up, everybody; I don't want none of this rich stuff around making my modest, domestic brews feel self-conscious or inferior."

Happier than he imagined he would be at seeing and being received by old friends and being introduced to their wives, Tony paused a moment to retort, "Don't blame me if your beer has identity problems, Platypus. You're the one who can't tell the difference between a stout and a lager. How are they supposed to know what they are if you don't?"

The guests laughed as Rhodey sputtered a protest, but no one heard it.

He stayed only three hours, and was genuinely disappointed when the time came for him to go. Rhodey wanted to know what was so urgent that he had to leave so early for, and Tony only needed to say, "Pepper", for his best friend to understand completely.

"Say no more, folks," Rhodey fielded complaints for him. "You see before you a man on a serious mission. He's off to woo a lady." Rhodey twisted around to see Tony, where he was putting on his jacket. "You _are_ going to woo her now, aren't you? Please, God, finally?"

"Yes, yes," Tony groused. His hand on the knob, he turned one more time, smirking at Rhodey. "But you don't have to call me God. Tony'll do." And with a wink, he was out the door to the sounds of their friends plying Rhodey for information on Pepper.

Tony stood on Pepper's doorstep a full minute before gathering the courage to ring the bell. It was the point of no return for him, here with little more than wood separating them. He'd resolved himself to the course of action he'd set for the day, and he had no doubts. What he did have was the incredibly vulnerable need to do this _iright/i_, and while Tony considered himself a master at the game of seduction, he was almost a complete novice in the art of love and romance.

He was so lost in his thoughts that it surprised him when Pepper answered the door, though now he vaguely remembered pressing the button to announce himself.

She looked as radiant as Tony remembered her from his first visit, with his mother. The red of her dress was exactly his favorite color, and though she couldn't have known he was coming, a part of him wished that she'd worn it just for him.

"Tony?" Pepper's brow furrowed lightly, the way it always did when she was concerned. "Are you okay? Is everything alright?"

Tony smiled, trying not to fidget. From behind his back he drew a bouquet of blood red roses and milky white Asiatic lilies, holding them up like some sort of peace offering.

"Hi," he exhaled, giving her a crooked, boyish smile. "Merry Christmas."

Pepper looked startled, but she opened the door wider, accepting the flowers with a curious tilt of her head. "Merry Christmas," she returned automatically, then looked up at him with a faint blush. "They're beautiful, Tony. Thank you." Wracking her brain, she tried to figure out a way to ask 'what are you doing here?' without sounding rude.

Not that she wasn't glad to see him.

Fortunately, Tony spared her the effort. "I was hoping… I know I interrupted when you were offering… and I was an asshole…"

Pepper slowly raised an eyebrow, but remained quiet as he fumbled for words.

Tony frowned, frustrated by his inability to find the words he needed. He huffed a sigh and tried again. "If the offer still stands, I was hoping you'd allow me to spend Christmas with you."

Surprised yet again, it took a few seconds longer for a smile to brighten her face than usual. "The offer still stands," Pepper told him. "I'm just about to go volunteer at the Kitchen for a few hours, but after that…" she hesitated, looking at him. "Unless you want to come with me."

Tony's smile was blinding. "I'd love to. Are you ready to go now? Your chariot awaits." He made a formal, shallow bow.

Feeling a little like she'd dropped through a rabbit hole, Pepper grinned, both at his agreement, and his show of gallantry. She hadn't really expected him to say yes, although she wasn't sure why. Tony did a great deal of charity work, so it wasn't really unusual that he _would_ agree.

Maybe it was because it was Christmas Day, a day he normally hibernated through, yet here he was, asking for her company and agreeing to do something with her, so completely at odds with his usual activities for that day. He could have been at home in his lab, or out somewhere with any number of women.

But he was in her home still waiting for an answer, so Pepper turned and grabbed her coat saying as she did, "Yes, I'm ready."

Tony helped her into her coat while she continued to study him suspiciously and then led the way back outside, waiting while she locked the door.

"It's not very far," she told him. "You don't have to drive, I usually just walk down the bea-" Pepper stopped abruptly as she turned around, staring at the street beyond Tony.

In front of her house, there was a deep red carriage designed to look like a sleigh. A man in full livery, including a dark green coat with tails, shiny gold buttons and a top hat, stood next to the sleigh, obviously waiting to perform his duty.

Beside him, harnessed and attached to reigns of green leather adorned with bells, were a team of four white horses. Ebony blinders obscured anything happening on either side of them to prevent nervousness, and for the moment they simply waited, proud and happy to be outside.

Tony waited with far more patience than he usually showed, for her to say something.

Stunned, seconds ticked by before Pepper finally turned to meet Tony's eyes. "It's beautiful," she breathed. "Amazing."

Having grown up in Connecticut, it had taken Pepper a long time to adjust to Christmas without snow, or even any perceptible change in the seasons. Somehow, surfing on Christmas didn't have the same magic for her as making snowmen and snow angels, and drinking hot cocoa and cider to fight off the chill afterward.

It was still a typical southern California day, but for just a moment, the familiar strain of 'White Christmas' drifted through her heart without the slightest hint of irony.

Tony watched her silently, his own heart tightening in his chest at the raw tenderness written all over her face. He hadn't let himself consider what he would do if she didn't love him in return, but in the span of her bated breath, he realized that to move on from this point without her was a far worse fate than the death he'd seen himself facing during the night.

Offering an arm, Tony gazed at her so intently that the pink in her cheeks moved down her throat and over her décolletage. His eyes followed the color exodus, but flicked back up to her eyes immediately.

"Ride with me?" he asked.

Something in his eyes broadcast his fear that she'd say no, and something else, right on the surface, caused a flutter of hope in her chest, like a caged bird. It was an emotion Pepper usually fought, along with several others, but right now she wasn't thinking about that. Or anything else that didn't have to do with Tony and a red sleigh.

"I'd love to." Pepper said softly as she took his arm.

Emboldened by her acceptance, Tony turned slightly, cupping her cheek. A happy smile curved his lips, and the sincerity of it made Pepper's breath catch in her throat. He slid his thumb along the ridge of her cheekbone, tempted to kiss her now, but held off.

Tony had kissed many women, but this would be his first time kissing Pepper, and he wanted it to be the kiss that turned all the clichés on their head. Her last first kiss; the one she'd always remember; the kiss by which all those before and after would be measured. He wanted it to be perfect, and he was willing to wait to make it so.

Covering the hand looped around his arm with his own hand, Tony led Pepper to the sleigh-shaped carriage. The driver had seen them coming, and stepped down to open the door and offer them a hand inside. Pepper thanked him with a shy smile, and Tony nodded, settling himself next to Pepper and spreading the faux fur blanket across their laps. The morning was cool and crisp, this close to the ocean, and though it wasn't snowing, it was still perfect winter weather for snuggling. He put his arm around her, silently making the invitation.

The shelter wasn't far, and Tony had given the address to the driver in advance, but he'd also instructed the man to take the scenic route. At first, Pepper seemed tense, unsure how to hold herself, so close to Tony, but as the cold began to seep further into her bones, she gradually succumbed to the lure of his body heat, leaning into him. Under the auspices of keeping her warm, Tony tightened his arm around her shoulders, rubbing her far bicep vigorously, and grinning at the shiver he was certain had nothing to do with the cold.

There was little conversation between them, and they made little eye contact, as though doing either would break the spell that had settled over them, and fantasy or not, neither wanted this thing that was happening to end.

By the time they got out of the Malibu hills, the sun was high and the weather much warmer, but neither Tony nor Pepper seemed inclined to pull out of the embraced they'd moved into on the ride down the Pacific Coast Highway, until they at last came to a stop in front of the church for which Tony had given the driver directions.

Pepper seemed more than a little surprised that Tony knew the destination of the place where she did her charity work, but Tony merely smiled cheekily and for once, she let him have his secrets.

He got down first from the carriage and offered her his hand and Pepper accepted it. Tony's other hand came up to her waist to help her down and when she hit pavement, she found herself in his arms again. It was another moment in which he could have kissed her, yet Tony refrained once more. Instead, he wound a loose strand of hair around his finger and simply tucked it back behind her ear with the softest of smiles, reserved only for her.

Studying his face curiously, Pepper was going to ask what this was all about, when Jesse Howell appeared from the beach.

"Wow," he said, eyes widening in surprise at the sight of the sleigh-carriage. "That's something else." His eyes darting from Pepper to Tony, who was grinning at him with unsuppressed glee, Jesse said to Pepper, "I stopped by your place on my way up the beach but I guess you were already gone." He looked at Tony's smug expression again. "Mind introducing me?"

"Oh!" Pepper turned the color of her dress and tried to step away from Tony, but he wasn't having it; he just stepped in closer behind her, extending his hand out toward Jesse over her shoulder.

"Tony Stark," he offered. He was tempted to put an arm around Pepper, or a hand on her waist, but he was struck by the sudden insight that something so proprietary would piss her off to no end.

Pepper was watching him closely and his instinct, for once, seemed to be right on the money. "Tony is my boss," she told Jesse, smiling weakly between the two of them. "And my friend," she added more confidently. "Tony, this is my friend Jesse Howell. Jesse is-"

"We've met, actually," Tony interjected. "It's been a long time, but we used to travel in the same circles, didn't we Howell?"

Pepper seemed a little surprised by that fact, which made Jesse more that a little nervous. He hadn't tried to hide his party boy past from her, but he had certainly hoped to play down the similarities between himself and her employer, not to mention their age differences. Tony just smiled serenely.

"Yes, before I cleaned myself up, I spent a lot of time with the same people you hang out with, Mr. Stark," Jesse commented finally. "But those days are long behind me now. I spend most of my free time down at the Taverna now. You ever go?"

Tony shrugged. "To be honest, I haven't been going out as much lately either. I spend my spare time in the lab though, so no, no Taverna either." He looked at Pepper. "Although I hope to spend even less time out with the old crowd than ever, so who knows where I'll be spending my time?"

Surprised, Pepper blinked at Tony a few times before saying, "We should go inside, shouldn't we?"

Grinning widely, Tony just nodded and made a grand, sweeping gesture for her to lead the way, then stepped in front of Jesse to follow after her.

Pepper always enjoyed watching Tony do charity work. It always reminded her to schedule him for more of it, as opposed to forcing him to sit through meetings or something else he hated.

Neither she nor Tony were particularly religious, but Pepper had been doing work through this church with various charities for years now. In fact, there were several charities here today besides the Kitchen. While Pepper, Tony, Jesse and several other member of their team served soup, bread and other food items to the less fortunate, another group had a Santa Claus passing out presents to children, and yet another was offering free medical and dental exams.

Tony never complained about this sort of work, just rolled up his sleeves and dug right in. Whenever he looked up, Pepper was watching him with an increasingly tender expression on her face, which only reminded him that there was an added benefit to the good work he was doing here today.

To Pepper's mind though, there was one thing that separated Tony from the rest of the volunteers – even men like Jesse. Both men were celebrities in their own right – Tony a billionaire industrialist, a superhero whose face was on magazines in every newsstand throughout the world. Jesse was a T.V. star and a musician who was easily recognized on any street corner. Both of them had been asked for their autograph more than once today, and were more than happy to give to their public.

But when Jesse went on his breaks and to eat his own meal, he went to sit in the back along with the rest of the volunteers.

Tony grabbed a bowl of soup and a hunk of bread from the same table as the people they were serving were being fed from and sat down on the floor between two boys with a fire engine.

"Hey," he said, casually. "What're you guys, up to?"

"Tryin' ta get this engine ta work," one of the boys answered, his face screwed up in concentration.

Tony frowned at the engine in the boy's hands, studying it. "Mind if I try?"

It was at that moment Pepper knew her days of hiding her affections for Tony were over.

Getting her own food, she went to sit on the floor with Tony and the children, her nice dress be damned. Tony grinned at her when she joined them, but quickly returned his attention to the two boys and the fire engine, which was proving troublesome. Pepper wasn't surprised to see that he had produced a miniature tool kit from somewhere, it's unzippered halves lay open with a vacant spot for the screw driver he now held in his hands.

"Here's your problem," he bent forward to show the boys the empty battery hub. "Looks like somebody forgot to hook you up with some batteries for this guy."

Pepper frowned. "There weren't any taped to the package?" she asked. That was usually the way organizations tried to arrange things for gifts that required batteries. It wasn't right to expect low-income families to have to provide things like that for gifts they couldn't afford in the first place. She exchanged a look with Tony.

He was way ahead of her. Standing up, Tony raised his voice above the din of the dining hall. Speaking to all the families, he stepped up onto a bench so that he could be seen better and said, "Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen! If I could have your attention for just one second, that would be much appreciated."

He waited until the noise died down. "I'm afraid there's been a terrible mistake. We've got a young man up here who was given a present that requires batteries, but did not come with any. Now, I know this is an easy thing to over look, so I was wondering if maybe this had happened to anyone else this year. Come on now, don't be shy; tell me what size battery you need, and how many – Pep, can you take notes?"

There was a pause as if the room froze, and then suddenly people realized what was happening. Someone passed Pepper a notepad and pen and within minutes the two of them had taken a quick inventory of how many batteries in what sizes where needed to make the various Christmas presents work.

With great solemnity, Tony deputized the two boys whose fire engine he'd been playing with and the three of them made an emergency run in the sleigh-carriage to the nearest open store, returning with enough batteries to power everything that lacked them, twice over.

Jesse was disgruntled. He'd had plans to romance Pepper that afternoon – or to kiss her, at least. But he knew his plans were futile as he watched her watch Tony Stark lift a small boy from the carriage with thick brown hair so messy it curled around his ears. The boy was carrying a plastic bag of batteries heavy enough to require both hands and his liquid brown eyes flashed with laughter in the exact same way as the man carrying him.

Pepper laughed as she watched the two of them, and in all the time Jesse had known her, he had never heard her sound quite so… happy; so hopeful.

"He'll break your heart," Jesse tried to warn her, to spare her what he considered inevitable agony.

Pepper's smile didn't falter, but she turned to him with eyes wide with innocence. "I have no idea what you're talking about," she fed him the official line. There was, of course, nothing going on between her and her employer… at least at the moment. If and when there was, they would figure out what to say to anyone and everyone then, but until that moment, it was her duty to maintain the status quo. However…

"But if I did know, and if there were anything to your speculations – I wouldn't know that unless I tried, now would I?"

And with that, Pepper went to Tony's side, where he had just returned the child to its' mother and was now standing alone in the thinning crowd.

There were people all around them, but to Pepper, it felt as though they were standing alone in the middle of a rushing river. That was the only way to explain the movement all around them, as well as the sound. "That was a very noble thing you just did," she said quietly.

Despite the noise, Tony heard her. He gave her a self-conscious half-shrug. "Couldn't disappoint kids on Christmas," he said. "Or you."

"Let's go home," she heard herself suggesting, and by the hopeful, fearful look in his eyes, Pepper wondered if Tony was feeling just as lost and determined as she felt.

She took his hand.

"Do you mind?"

Pepper was surprised. "No, not at all. I didn't have any plans, but…"

Tony's palms were sweating. He was more nervous about this than any other part of his plan. "I've never done this before," he confessed.

"I've seen you cook," Pepper disagreed, soothingly.

"No, I mean… I've cooked – sort of." Tony stood in the middle of Pepper's kitchen, looking lost. "Just not like this. Not this actual meal." He looked at her, his heart pounding in his chest.

"This is the meal my mother used to cook for us on Christmas Eve." His voice was soft, and very subdued. Tony needed her to understand not just the importance of the meal to him, but the significance of his sharing it with her. "She never cooked on Christmas Day – she had Jarvis to do that, but she always cooked Christmas Eve dinner herself. I'm a little late, but I wanted to…" He smiled faintly and crookedly.

"I hope you like seafood."

Pepper stood completely still throughout his explanation, one hand poised above her heart as she heard his words and finally understood exactly what he was telling her. Tears rose in her eyes as she crossed the room to stand in front of him, searching his eyes just as intently as he searched hers for his fate. Standing on tiptoe, she put her arms around his neck and gave him a moment to respond with his arms around her waist. Turning her head, Pepper leaned in to kiss him.

_Now_. He'd been waiting for his perfect moment, and it wasn't going to get any better than this. It was so easy to tighten his arms around her and dip his head to take what was being offered. She was so sweet that he moaned softly, and it was as though he'd lived through several lifetimes in one night just to get to this moment with her right here. Tony knew many things, but he realized that the most important thing he knew, kissing Pepper, was that he was an idiot, and that he knew absolutely _nothing_ if he'd been willing to let this - _this_ - go. Now that he had it, he'd never be able to live without it again. Kissing her was like pressing a conch shell against his ear, and he wanted all of the good things he'd seen – her forever, marriage, a baby…

But for now, just Pepper, and Pepper's mouth, her scent, her taste, and the feel of Pepper's body against his.

Pepper's breath was feathery against his face and he opened his eyes to see hers sharp and _loving_ staring back at him. "We'll make it together," she whispered shakily, all but hanging from him, supported by his arms around her. It took him a minute to realize she was talking about the food and not with some prescient knowledge of the future. "It'll be a new tradition."

Tony's smile was so bright it could have lit her villa on fire. "Merry Christmas, Pepper," he said, brushing a hand through her hair affectionately. "I'm going to buy you another da Vinci; without you, I truly would be lost."

Her own smile growing to match his, Pepper levered up to steal another kiss. She had always believed in Christmas miracles and somehow, she had gotten one of her very own. She didn't know how or why, but she would be forever grateful for it. "Merry Christmas, Tony. And God bless us, everyone."


	6. Chapter 6

**An Iron Man Christmas Carol ~**

**A Love Story**

_Stave the Sixth_

_In which the protagonist of our story gets lucky._

With groceries delivered from the nearest open delicatessen, Tony and Pepper made and ate Christmas dinner together.

It was an unhurried, sensual affair, marked by the sharing of bites and long, meaningful glances, but without any sense of urgency.

Tony hadn't done much cooking on his own, and hadn't ever prepared this particular meal, but with Pepper's help to fill in the blanks in his memory with quick Internet searches, they managed to conjure up a meal close enough to suit what Tony remembered from his childhood. Pepper filed their cobbled together version of the recipe away into her own private collection "for next year," she told him, eyes shining.

His own glowed happily in response.

"Shall I pour us some wine?" Tony eyed the selection of bottles in the wine rack above the sink in Pepper's kitchen. Pulling one or two out, he was pleased to note that they were all excellent labels - probably gifts from him and other corporate 'friends', or else she'd culled a discerning taste in fine wine over the years. That fact did not surprise him.

Pepper finished putting away the last of the dishes, watching his exploration as she dried her hands on a cream-colored dishtowel, her eyes making him wonder where exactly her mind was. "Go ahead," she answered after a moment. "I'm going to start a fire in the fireplace.

With a grin as she disappeared, Tony selected a bottle and first sampled the vintage, pouring just a little into his own glass. It was a good year, and an excellent label. Completing his service, filling two glasses and setting them and the bottle on a tray, Tony took them into the living room, where he'd seen the fireplace earlier in the evening.

He'd assumed she'd gone there when she'd said she was going to start a fire, but although the Christmas tree twinkled merrily in it's corner, the hearth stood cold and dark. It took him a minute to remember – with a twist of hope in his stomach – that there was another fireplace upstairs, in Pepper's bedroom.

Hardly daring to breath least he be wrong, Tony carried the service tray upstairs and around the corner to the door he remembered from his earlier visit as leading to Pepper's bedroom.

Tapping lightly, the door fell inward a few inches anyway. "Pepper?"

She was crouched in front of the fireplace in the sitting area portion of her bedroom, the gas flame just springing to life amid the brightly colored bits of cut glass arrayed in the tray below.

Looking up, Pepper's cheeks were pink, and Tony wondered if it was due to the warmth of the flame, or the fact that she had skillfully maneuvered him into her bedroom. He grinned at her, and the deepening color confirmed his suspicions.

"I thought we might be more comfortable-," she started to say.

He interrupted her, not wanting her to waste a second on embarrassment. "Wine?" he asked, setting the tray down and extending one of the glasses he'd filled toward her.

Keeping her eyes on his, wondering what he was thinking, Pepper accepted the glass and took a drink, perhaps a little too quickly, because Tony chuckled. Drinking from his own glass, Tony moved closer to her and sat down on the loveseat, patting the cushion beside him.

Pepper gave him just one wary look before remembering that this was her idea, that she wanted to be here, and exhaled as she sat beside him, willing herself to relax again.

Watching her, a little dismayed, Tony put his arm around her the way he had that morning in the carriage. "Pepper," he said softly. "We don't have to do this," he assured her. "We could," his eyes landed on the flat screen T.V. "Watch a seasonal movie." Her amused snort and incredulously raised eyebrow told him what she thought of that suggestion.

"What?" he teased, daring to lean in to kiss her neck. "I could be in the mood for _'It's A Wonderful Life'_." Encouraged by her shiver, Tony moved to kiss lower – the enticing skin of her décolletage that always changed color, depending on her mood. "Maybe _'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer'_, you know I feel a kinship toward a fellow inebriate."

"Tony…" Pepper exhaled, but whether out of exasperation over his words or to encourage his actions, it was difficult to tell.

"Alright, alright," Tony murmured distractedly, his hand reaching to take the elastic from her hair, tossing it aside so that he could run his fingers through the silken tresses unhindered. "Then it'll have to be _'Die Hard'_, or nothing. That's my final offer."

Pepper's eyes were closed; she was having difficulty focusing when they were open, but at this, she attempted to turn her head to look at him. "Tony… _'Die Hard'_ isn't a Christmas movie."

Loosening his tie, Tony pulled it over his head and tossed it away somewhere. He started to unbutton his shirt but Pepper's fingers stopped him, replacing his with her own. Fascinated, he watched her nimble fingers work the buttons, one by one.

"It's my _favorite_ Christmas movie," he confessed. "And it's as much a Christmas movie as '_It's A Wonderful Life' _is," he was completely distracted now. "They both take place on Christmas, and that's their only claim to the holiday." Pepper opened her mouth to argue but Tony had thoroughly tired of this discussion.

Arcing over her, he pressed his mouth to hers, humming in deep satisfaction when she responded instantly by winding her arms around him, bowing her own body up into the arc he'd created above her. Wrapping his arms around her waist, Tony pulled Pepper tightly against him, finally releasing her mouth only when he needed to find oxygen to breath.

Gasping for air only inches from her face, Tony said, "Alright. No Christmas movie then. We'll have to think of something else to do." Pepper nodded drunkenly. Diving back in to kiss her again, Tony ran his hand down the length of her side searching for the end of her dress.

Pepper clung to him, running her hands inside his shirt to his shoulders and pushing at the material until he shrugged it away, flinging it off to join his tie somewhere in the room behind them. The arc reactor shone through his muscle tee, and Pepper peeled that over his head as well so that he was bare-chested, braced above her on just one arm.

When he found the hem of her dress, Tony hesitated only as long as it took him to realize, hazily, that Pepper had been stripping him. Then he carefully pulled the red sheath from her body, leaving her only in the lacey black lingerie he'd caught her in that morning.

This time he didn't turn away, but made a show of looking his fill until Pepper was a dusky rose color, all over, from blushing. She held his gaze directly though, as if awaiting his appraisal, and when his eyes completed their circuit of her body and met hers again, they were full of hunger and desire.

"Pepper," he murmured.

Pushing herself up into a sitting position, Pepper reached behind her to undo her bra, but Tony stopped her. "Wait," he shook his head. "Not yet."

Lifting her into his arm, Tony carried her the fifteen or so feet to her bed and set her down on the soft, wine-colored comforter. Her pale skin looked even softer, more delicate against the jewel-tone material and he wanted nothing more than to spend hours touching her.

Loving her.

Stretching out alongside her, Tony noticed Pepper watching him, and he smiled softly, reassuringly. She smiled back and it felt as though a hand were clenching around his heart.

Nodding, Tony watched as Pepper once again reached behind her and this time, removed the scrap of cloth coving her breasts from view. The sight of them bared to him, when he'd spent years imagining this moment…

Tony had seen many breasts in his time. Even a lot of what you might call 'perfect' breasts, given the southern California regions penchant for breast augmentation surgery. But Pepper's were natural, slightly more than a handful, upswept…

And the most beautiful things Tony had ever seen.

Looking to Pepper's eyes for permission, Tony moved in, first to touch, then to taste the gorgeous display she'd gifted him with. Swirling his tongue around the nearest stiff peak, he kept his eyes on Pepper's face as her head tilted back in pleasure and he drew a moan from her throat.

Her fingers burrowed deep into Tony's hair, holding his face close against her chest. Pepper would be lying if she said that she'd never imagined being with him like this, but she had never imagined that her body would respond to him with quite so much strength and urgency. It was overwhelming and almost a little frightening, but she didn't dare stop him.

Kissing his way down past her stomach, swirling his tongue into her belly button and making her arch up toward his mouth, Tony hooked his fingers around the ends of her panties, but didn't pull then down just yet. Instead he mouthed her sex through the black silk and lace and just _breathed_, exhaling warm air and inhaling the increasingly familiar scent of Pepper.

Beneath his mouth, Pepper twitched and bucked. Expelling a long, needy moan, her fingers curled like claws in his hair, pulling tightly. Her knees tried to come up on either side of his head but Tony wasn't ready for that yet. Ignoring her frustrated whine, he pushed up onto his elbows and pulled her panties down to midway on her thighs, restricting her movement.

He could tell by her body language and the frustrated sounds she was making that she was going to complain, but Tony knew what he was doing. Sliding his tongue along her cleft, he slid one probing finger inside her just as his tongue curled back upward to target her clitoris. Carefully adding a second finger, he sucked on that sensitive bundle of nerves, delighting in the way her body rocked upward into his mouth, and the way Pepper cried out his name - just as much as he enjoyed the sweet, exquisitely honeyed taste of her.

Pepper was dying. She had to be, because although it had been a long time since she'd had sex (not since she'd been in a relationship back when she'd first been promoted as Tony's assistant; that asshole, Roger) he had never made her feel this good. And just as she came against Tony's mouth, shouting his name in graceless abandon, she remembered a drunken promise her employer had made the same Christmas Eve on which Roger had broken up with her.

'_I'm going to eat you out until dawn; see how many times I can make you come before I'm even inside you.'_

She was still shuddering through her release when the laughter came, as hard and unbidden as the memory.

Tony didn't question the laughter, he just grinned, mistaking it for euphoria. And in a way, it was. Pulling her panties off completely, he tossed them aside and hooked her legs over his shoulders so that he could dive in better and taste her more fully.

"Oh, God," Pepper moaned, shaking at just the touch of his breath against her skin, she was still so sensitized.

But Tony didn't intend to linger there for long. Attending to her oh so gently, he remained only long enough to clean up the remnants of her orgasm and to tease her toward the beginnings of a second before he once again climbed the length of her body in search of her mouth. Tasting herself on his lips, Pepper found herself growing even more aroused, to her own surprise.

Tony was still half dressed, but Pepper could feel his arousal pressing against her. She realized that he'd kept his pants on all this time to prevent himself from losing control while he saw to her needs. It was by far, one of the least selfish things she had ever seen him do, and she couldn't help grinning, even while she was kissing him.

Reaching between them, Pepper cupped the thick bulge of Tony's erection through his pants. Immediately he stopped kissing her – he froze entirely, hissing in a breath of surprise and desire.

She was watching his face and it took him a moment to realize it. He remembered to breath about the same time, turning to meet her eyes, his own dark with passion as he panted heavily. Without a word, Pepper slid her hand up the length of him to his belt buckle where her other hand joined the first and made quick work of both his it, and the fastenings on his pants.

Pepper wasn't expecting him to be wearing underwear. He wasn't. It made it that much easier for her to press his slacks down around his hips, reach in and remove his cock. He was heavy in her hands, thick, and as she gave him and experimental stroke, she could feel Tony jump even before she heard him moan.

Grasping her shoulder, Tony bowed his head, closing his eyes and willing himself not to just lose himself right there in her hand. Pushing out of his pants, he didn't toss them away as he'd done with the rest of his clothes but only so that he could extract his condom case.

Once she realized what he was doing, Pepper stopped him, putting a hand over his. "It's okay," she said, her voice breaking as though she hadn't spoken in years rather than minutes. She cleared her throat. "It's okay. I've been getting shots for years – for the hormones," she explained. "And we both get screened regularly; I see the results, so…"

Tony felt strangely like crying.

Everything he had experienced with the Spirits – it had all been about love, of course. But one of the things he had learned was that real love was impossible without trust, and that was what Pepper was giving to him. What she _did_ give to him every day. And it would be what he would give her from this day forward.

Starting now.

Tossing his pants aside, tossing the case aside, Tony cupped Pepper's cheek and kissed her again, long and deep, his tongue delving into the cavern of her mouth to caress its dark hidden depths and drink her inner sweetness.

Tony hovered over her, flattening his palm over the soft skin of her belly and splaying his fingers. Sliding his hand upward until he could cup her breasts, first one, then the other, he rolled their pleasant weight in his hand, thumbing her nipple and smiling when she shuddered.

When he moved between her hips, Pepper's breath caught, and she could see the mixture of want, desire, and fear in his eyes that were an echo of her own emotions. Somehow, knowing that he was just as nervous as she was helped encourage her that it was the right time.

He kissed her when he entered her, and their gasps were swallowed in each other's mouths.

Tony spent several moments just kissing Pepper's face, which was screwed up with both pleasure and discomfort. It had been awhile for her, and although her body was more than ready to accept him, even practiced women occasionally were unprepared for his girth. He waited, breathing heavily, until _she_ began to move under _him_.

Whispering her name like a prayer, Tony withdrew from her almost completely; her tight heat was almost unbearable, but he couldn't stay away from it for long. Thrusting inside her with a protracted groan, he realized instantly that this would be over far too quickly for his liking. He had wanted her for far too long and she felt impossibly good.

Pepper wrapped her legs around his waist, trying to bring him closer, or deeper, she wasn't sure which, just that she needed it now. The open, needy expression on Tony's face wasn't just about sex, although it was astonishing to her how clearly she could see that he wanted her. He wanted _her_. Not just any woman. It made her want to laugh again with joy, but all she could manage now was a moan of pleasure as the rhythm of his thrusts increased.

No, she could see something else too, and when he opened his eyes, Pepper could see what he had yet to put into words. What even she had yet to verbalized, and something inside her went off like a firework.

"Tony," she gasped, reaching up to take his face in both her hands. "Tony." He was somewhere else entirely at first, his hair tousled, and his large chocolate brown eyes so wide, for a moment she could image what he must have looked like as a little boy.

Pepper smiled at the confusion in his eyes. "I love you," she said. She laughed to hear herself say the words out loud. To _him_. And in the middle of having sex with him. "Tony," she said again. "I love you."

She actually felt his heart beat faster. Tony kissed her, so hard she squeaked in surprised. He still hadn't withdrawn from her body, but he gave her the most solemn look she had ever seen from him since the day, post Iron man, that he gave her that speech about knowing what he had to do.

"Pepper Potts, I love you, too. And I'm not just saying that because of where my dick is."

Rolling her eyes, Pepper swatted his chest, but grinned widely. "I know that, actually," she confessed.

Tony's grin grew wider. "Good," he exhaled, relieved. "I just wanted to make sure you didn't think that."

He leaned in to kiss her again, and Pepper accepted his lips, but the moment his hips began to rock forward again, she put a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

"Ah-ah," she denied breathily.

"Ah-ah?" Tony looked pained.

"Roll over," Pepper urged him. "On your back."

He blinked at her once before complying, praying he understood her intentions correctly.

Pepper waited until he'd assumed the correct position then knelt beside his prone form. Taking his cock in hand, she stroked him gently, taking the opportunity to examine him properly.

Watching her, even incredibly aroused and rocking in her hand, Tony had time for a smug grin at her obvious appraisal. Raising as eyebrow, he was pleased to see he could still make her blush at this stage of the game. He loved that about her.

And then she took him in her mouth, and Tony loved her even more. "Holy shit… Pepper, holy shit!"

Pepper laugh around him, and he nearly lost it. Grabbing a fistful of her hair, he held on for dear life as she slowly sucked him in, her tongue dancing around his flesh, and Tony's head dropped backward.

It had been a long time since she had done this, but once upon a time she had enjoyed the intimacy of the act. And Tony seemed to be enjoying it too… just the right combination of hand, tongue, just a little bit of teeth and then tongue again, swirling, molding to his flesh - she could taste herself on him again, and it was almost obscene how much she was enjoying that.

Tony couldn't take it anymore. Pulling Pepper up and over him so that she was draped across his body, he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her, shoving his tongue in her mouth.

Breaking the kiss long enough to speak he mumbled, "Keep that up, I wasn't gonna be able to fuck you any longer." He kissed her again, thrusting his erection against her thigh. "And I really want to fuck you longer."

Pepper laughed. "So romantic," she chided. "You would have gotten hard again," she teased, practically. "It wouldn't have taken all that long either, I'm betting."

His mouth was at her throat but she could feel him grinning. "Hmph. But I want you right now…"

He thrust again, and Pepper's breath caught in her throat. Positioning herself over him, she said, "Well, they you'd better take what you want, hadn't you?"

Not needing to be told twice, he tightened his arms around her, his face pillowed between her breasts, and thrust up into her body, moaning in satisfaction.

Mouth hanging open – this was… superb – eyes closed, Pepper reached blindly for Tony's hands, which he gave her, watching her from beneath lazy eyelids.

Using the heels of his palms for leverage, Pepper set a nice steady rhythm, rocking back and forth, building in speed until Tony had to reach for her waist to help her ride him, bucking up to meet her until at last, with a throaty cry, he felt her tighten around him and then she was shuddering in his arms.

Holding on to her tightly, Tony kissed wherever he could reach as he let go, rutting into her with rhythmlessly, till finally he too was spasming through his release.

Rolling onto his side, Tony pulled her into his arms, his face buried in her hair.

For a time, it was quiet until Pepper rolled to face him, unsuccessfully masking the worry on her face.

"Are you staying?" she asked.

Wishing that he were never in a position to have caused her that kind of concern, Tony brushed a few strands of hair away from her face. "I'm staying as long as you let me, Pep," he said. "Or till we both go back to my place," he amended.

Pepper said nothing, but she studied him for a long moment, as if seeking the veracity of his answer, then nodded.

Tony kissed her and offered a smile. "Do I need to make this official? Pepper Potts, will you be my girl, until such a sufficient time has passed that I can ask you to move in with me, and/or be my wife?" Seeing the shock on her face, he added, "I've wasted more than enough time on this, Pep; but I'm not gonna screw it up by skipping steps here. I'm in it for the long haul, and I want you to know it so that no slick bastard like Jesse Howell sneaks in and tries to poach what's mine… but I'm willing to wait so that we can do thing right. So yes - I'll be here in the morning, and next week, and next year.

"That is… if you'll have me?" He asked, signs of vulnerability in his eyes.

Pepper, who had been listening to him wide-eyed, smiled.

"Yes."


End file.
